


Jealous

by NotSoEvilPanda (Alexis_Payton)



Series: The One With The Lenas [2]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Cheese, F/F, Insecurity, Jealousy, Light Smut, Sequel, Some Fluff, SuperCorp, angst duh, coz i'm a prude in public
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:33:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 31,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24079819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alexis_Payton/pseuds/NotSoEvilPanda
Summary: Sequel to Jaded.With someone stealing advanced technological equipment from high-security facilities around the world, and Kara always just a step behind them, the very last thing she needed was to deal with past lovers causing tension in her relationship.
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Series: The One With The Lenas [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1711873
Comments: 228
Kudos: 558





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I guess you could read this as a stand-alone, but you'll feel these two more if you read Jaded first and see the road they'd taken to get where they are. Just click on the "previous work" link in the "the one about the Lenas" series in the description.
> 
> A lot of this is still in my head and I'm busy with other projects so updates and replies to comments will be sporadic.
> 
> I sincerely hope you enjoy this fic. The first chapter is a thank you to those who made the angsty journey with me throughout Jaded updates lol
> 
> Anyway. Hope you enjoy!
> 
> @NotSoEvilPanda
> 
> Edit: I added a lot of throwbacks to Jaded coz I’m sappy like that, so probably best to read it.

“Are you being mind-controlled by some alien?” Alex deadpanned from beside her and Kara jumped in her skin. “You’ve been staring at that wine for almost ten minutes.”

Dragging her gaze from the two glasses of merlot that stood on Alex and Kelly’s immaculate kitchen counter top, she looked at her sister. “No. No mind-control.”

“Okay…What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing, I came to get Lena some wine.”

“Are you gonna go give it to her physically…or are you trying to give it to her telepathically?”

Kara sighed. “She's just been acting weird lately.”

“Weird how?” Across the room Lena laughed at something Sam said. “She seems fine.”

“I dunno. I feel like she's hiding something from me.”

“Something like what?”

“Not something that worries me, just something that makes me curious. I don't know how to explain it.”

“Do you need to know everything that goes on in her life?”

“I would like to.”

“Some innocent secrets are fine.”

“Do you know something?”

“What did we discuss about me and Lena?”

Kara rolled her eyes and Alex pointedly lifted her brows.

“That having my sister and girlfriend being friends is the best thing to have ever happened to me.”

“And?”

“And that I should never make you choose between me and Lena because I love you both and I'm not an asshole.”

“Exactly. For the record, I don't know anything you need to worry about.”

“So you _do_ know something…”

“Fine,” Alex said and took a dramatic sip of her scotch to ensure she had Kara’s full attention. “Don’t tell her I told you, but Lena’s pregnant.”

A variety of things happened to Kara’s body in that moment, a rise in temperature, increased heart rate, expanding chest, but probably most noticeable to everyone was the massive grin that split her face from ear to ear until she was slapped on the shoulder. Hard.

“Ouch!” It didn’t hurt, it was just the surprise of it all and she scowled at Alex.

“What. The. _Hell_ , Kara?” she lowly hissed.

“What do you mean what?”

“Why didn’t you laugh like a normal person when being told her girlfriend’s pregnant? Did you get Lena pregnant? Can you get Lena pregnant?”

“No, I can’t get Lena pregnant,” she sadly mumbled. “And the things you guys do at work, I thought maybe there was a non-fatal baby-making accident and soon a tiny little Lena will be running around…Can you imagine it, Alex?” Kara’s heart swelled. “A mop of dark messy curls and dimpled cheeks…” She exhaled dreamily. “You shouldn’t mess with me like that.”

“Kara,” Alex said in a very serious tone that made Kara warily glance at her. “You and Lena will not, under any circumstances, have a child before Kelly and I do, do you understand me?”

Kara slowly nodded, the only one who thought that a possibility seemed to be Alex, so Kara thought it best to simply agree with her intensity.

“Good. Lena’s not hiding anything you need to worry about.”

Kara sighed, her shoulders hunched and she crossed her arms, leaning against the kitchen counter.

“Lena slept with Sam.”

“What!?”

Everyone in the apartment looked their way, even Brainy stopped whatever he was carefully explaining to Nia to stare, and Kara’s face flushed as she tried to send Lena a reassuring smile when she tilted her head in question.

“Mind keeping it down?” Kara gritted out.

“When?” Alex whispered.

“Right after the multiverse was destroyed.”

“Oh…”

“Yeah…”

“That was over a year ago, Kara…Why does it bother you?”

“It bothers me for a lot of reasons.”

“And you spoke to Lena about them?”

“I haven’t told her it bothers me.”

“How did you find out?”

“Sam asked if Lena had the mole on her thigh checked out. I dumbly wondered out loud when she saw it ‘cause it’s up really high.”

“And did she?”

“Yes, I just told you they slept together. Sam pretended the phone in her hand was ringing and left Lena to tell me.”

“No, did she have the mole checked out?”

“Yeah, Arnold’s fine. Nothing to worry about.”

“The mole is named Arnold?”

“Yeah, Lena names things weirdly, it’s going to be a battle when we have kids—”

“You know what, never mind. People have sexual histories, Kara. You can’t hold this against her.”

“Sam’s her best friend.”

“I’m her best friend.”

“Fine, you’re both her best friend and work with her and see her every day, sometimes more than I do and it’s weird.”

“You and Sam do have a lot in common.”

“We do?”

“Kara, you’re both basically wearing the same outfit today.”

Kara looked down at her light pink button-down, and belted grey dress pants and loafers, to Sam’s black button-down and darker grey pants and loafers.

“Coincidence,” she said. “We both came here from work. It’s work clothes.”

“You both have a love of pairing tank tops and blazers.”

That was true.

“We have clothes in common.”

“You’re both also all sunshine and rainbows and big smiles until you’re very much not.”

Kara sighed. “Aren’t you supposed to be making me feel better instead of telling me how much I have in common with my girlfriend’s ex? The ex who moved away and who’s now back in town?”

“They dated?”

Kara winced. “No. Lena said it only happened once.”

“Are you worried she’ll cheat on you?”

Kara snorted. “No.”

“Then what? I don’t understand what’s going on with you right now.”

“Yeah, me neither.”

“Kara…” Alex said in that big sister voice and wrapped an arm across her shoulders. “I know that you’re technically still a baby gay, but you need to understand that we all—lesbian, bi, pan, ace—we're all part of the same Sapphic Circle.”

“Okay?”

“And in that Sapphic Circle, we date each other and each other’s exes.”

Kara sighed again.

“Once, Maggie took me to a party where I met four of her exes at once. Two were engaged to each other, one tried to hook up with her and the other tried to hook up with me, but eventually went home with each other even though they’d broken up three times already.”

“Sounds gross and incestuous.”

Alex nodded sagely. “That’s why I grabbed Kelly the instant she moved here and married her as soon as I could. All her baggage is in another city and I don’t need to deal with her being friends with her exes right in my face.”

“Lucky you.”

“I know. Point is, Lena loves you, no matter who she's been with in the past, okay?”

She absently nodded, her gaze finding Lena across the room who smiled, though her eyes glowed with concern. Kara’s odd behaviour had definitely not gone unnoticed.

***

She sat on the white couch in the living room, blindly staring at the television screen and tried not to listen to Lena moving around the apartment. Something that became infinitely harder when the scent of lavender preceded Lena’s appearance in a set of delicate black lingerie. A quick glance revealed a lace, boned bustier corset with a set of garters attached to thigh-high stockings and a pair of 6-inch heels.

Sensing Lena sitting down on the armchair to her right, Kara swallowed thickly and kept her gaze on the TV. Her legs were smooth and shimmering beneath the sheer stockings; so pale, that when Lena crossed them, Kara could see her thighs practically glowing out the corner of her eye.

It was a trap.

She knew it was and that she shouldn’t look, but couldn’t help herself. Her head turned before she’d even made up her mind to and she drank in the sight. Lena’s cleavage was pushed up and Kara just wanted to go lay her cheek on her breasts and willingly smother herself to death between them.

“Oh, so this is what it takes to get your attention?”

_Darn it._

She knew she shouldn’t have looked and bit her lip, hanging her head.

“Is this about me sleeping with Sam?” Lena flat out asked and Kara spluttered.

“What? Why? Why would you ask that?”

“Because you haven’t spoken to her since you found out, and go out of your way to avoid her like you did earlier by not bringing me my wine because she was there talking to me.”

Yeah, she shouldn’t have kept Lena away from her wine.

Lena sighed, got up, and walked over. Kara tensed but removed her hands from her lap when Lena’s knees brushed her own and was unsurprised when a whole lot of Lena settled on her lap, like the sexiest ventriloquist doll to have ever existed.

“These are new…” Kara mumbled, brushing the back of her fingers up the corset toward Lena’s breast. It had taken weeks for Lena to be comfortable enough to have Kara touch her like that. Each time she was permitted, felt like a gift.

“For someone so strong, you find a twisted satisfaction in tearing apart my delicate things. I’m constantly forced to replace them…”

“I maintain that those were all accidents,” she said and pinched Lena’s pebbled nipple through the fabric, making her arch into the touch, eyes growing dark. Softly humming, she covered Kara’s hand with her own, making it cup her breast.

“This grumpy pout you’ve been sporting all evening is confusing me,” Lena murmured, settling in as Kara cradled her back and played with her breasts.

“My face is confusing you?” she absently wondered, inhaling the intoxicating scent of a freshly showered, shaved, and moisturised Lena.

“Yes. I don’t know whether I want to kiss it or sit on it.”

Kara groaned and pressed a clumsy kiss to Lena’s forehead. “Why are you like this?”

“The answer is in the better question.”

“Lena...Please don’t talk in riddles while your breasts are in my face. You know I can’t concentrate like this.”

“I do it because you like it.”

Kara nodded, unable to deny that.

“You find my breasts calming,” Lena continued. “Thought I would dress them up for you while we talked.”

“I appreciate that, but I’m just being stupid.”

“If it’s bothering you this much, it’s not stupid.”

“This can’t be a healthy way to communicate in a relationship,” Kara said, cupping Lena’s breast from beneath, revelling in the weight and how it made her cleavage jiggle.

“As opposed to not communicating at all?”

She slumped guiltily.

“I could move and get dressed if you want to try talking in a way that works for other people?”

The offer was sincere, so Kara quickly shook her head and held Lena closer, moving her hand to Lena’s thigh: the lesser of four evils.

That was until Lena spread her legs open, another trick no doubt, but Kara really did love these little games Lena played to set her at ease. Her fingers slid down the inside of Lena’s thigh and hooked beneath a suspender tied to the lacy garter belt and silky stockings. She desperately wanted to tear it to shreds, but wouldn't give Lena the satisfaction. Not yet, at least.

Lena's lips twisted into a knowing smirk, as though she could read Kara's mind.

“It was just so recent,” she quietly confessed, watching her fingers trace the fabric of the suspender, resisting the urge to snap it. “And I know we’ve been together almost a year and it was before we sorted out our feelings…but, you got mad at me, Lena, and then you went to Metropolis and you slept with Sam.”

Lena groaned. “You’re leaving out a lot. That’s not how it happened, nor why I went to Metropolis.”

“Feels like it…”

“I woke up in a strange world, and went to who felt like my only remaining friend to make sure she was okay and I was immensely relieved to find that she even remembered me.”

The world didn’t remember Reign, Lena never took over Luthor Corp, but somehow Sam’s memory hadn’t been reset. Ruby thankfully didn’t remember a thing, and Kara didn’t need to be close to Sam to know that she wished the same for herself.

“We spoke about how sad I was with how things went with you, about my family’s abrupt presence in my life. And she spoke about, well that's her private business, but we found comfort in each other and we agreed it was a one-time thing.”

“But why was it a one-time thing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Sam's great.”

“She is…” Lena carefully agreed.

“You two seem good together and you fought Supergirl—me—and the D.E.O. to protect her and save her from Reign…And you have Venture Tech in common…I just don’t understand why you’re not with her.”

“Kara…” Lena’s voice cracked and Kara didn’t understand why she was the one feeling sad when Kara’s chest was aching. Lena pressed a soft kiss between her brows and Kara’s eyes nearly fluttered shut at the tenderness.

“Maybe before you and before Reign…” Lena started, but paused. “Sam and I don’t fit like you and I do.”

“No?”

“No, my darling,” Lena earnestly replied. Kara grinned sheepishly and kissed her, squeezing Lena’s thigh and enjoying the sharp intake of breath that stole the air from her lungs.

“I enjoy possessive you,” Lena mumbled against her mouth, “but it makes me sad that you don’t know that you’re the one that I want.”

“ _Ooh, ooh, ooh, honey_ ,” Kara sang, laughing when Lena lightly hit her shoulder and kissed her harder.

She hummed into the kiss, her hand moving up Lena’s thigh, around her waist, and laid her down on the couch. They weren’t done talking, Kara knew that even when Lena’s soft thighs cradled her hips and pulled her against her body.

Their system worked for them and Kara refused to feel strange about that.

Lena’s hips bucked, the lace damp against Kara’s stomach and she groaned, shoving her tongue into Lena’s mouth, shivering at the fingers running through her hair and massaging her scalp.

“Tell me what you want,” Kara muttered, kissing into Lena’s neck. A year ago, she would never have asked anyone something like that, but Lena had gently coaxed her out of her intimacy shell.

“Go get Ralph.”

Kara moaned and rolled her hips, but then whined and fell with her face onto Lena’s chest, letting out a disappointed sob at the high frequency sound buzzing in her ears.

Lena sighed.

“Wake me up when you get back.”

Kara lifted her head. “I’m sorry,” she said and accepted the chaste kiss placed on her lips.

“It’s okay, now go.”

She jumped up at superspeed, grabbed her glasses from the kitchen counter and was already on the balcony when she heard Lena’s voice.

“You forgot your watch.”

She flew back inside, grabbed the wristwatch on the side table, kissed Lena again so fast her hair fluttered around her head and flew off into the night, Lena’s soft laughter echoing in her heart.

***

It was just after 2am when she returned, floating around the quiet apartment to not disturb Lena passed out in the centre of the bed. Kara used the guest bathroom for a quick shower and dressed in only a large T-Shirt before she carefully slid beneath the covers.

“C-twenty, H-twenty-two,” Lena mumbled in her sleep when the bed dipped beneath Kara’s weight.

Grinning, she wrapped her arms around Lena, gently pulling her close. “N-eight, O-five,” she whispered, and Lena hummed turning in her arms, deliciously naked.

Kara sighed and laid on her back, knowing from her breathing that Lena was waking up, as she snuggled into her side.

“You okay?” Lena rasped.

“Yeah.” Kara kissed the top of her head, trying to get her to fall asleep again.

“You get’em?”

“Sort of.”

“Tell me.”

“They broke into the closed R&D department of Wayne Industries and stole some exoskeleton suit prototype thing they kept there. The thieves were dead by the time Kate and I managed to track them down.”

“Poison darts?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll check out the suit’s intended function tomorrow and let you know.”

Kara nodded and traced her fingers across Lena’s back, her mind racing.

“Can’t sleep?” Lena’s lips brushed against her chest.

“I’m okay,” she replied before Lena woke up even more, but it was too late and Lena shifted all that gorgeous naked flesh on top of Kara’s body.

“Want me to help?”

Kara grinned. “If you like.”

Lena took off Kara’s shirt and hugged her close, seeming to relish in the feel of their breasts pressed together, before she rolled onto her back, pulling Kara on top of her.

“So you’re in one of those moods…”

“’Still half-asleep, you’re going to need to do most of the work.”

Kara smirked and sat up, the sheets falling away as she straddled Lena. “You tiny humans have no stamin- _aaah_ ,” she groaned when Lena’s fingers stroked between her legs.

“What was that?”

“N-nothing…Absolutely nothing.”

“Thought so.”

And a smug Lena shouldn’t be so hot. Kara shouldn’t find her so attractive, but she obediently rubbed herself against Lena’s fingers, already wet and worked up from earlier that evening.

“Yes?” Lena asked, circling her entrance.

“Yes,” she replied and softly moaned when Lena slipped a finger inside her. It wasn’t fair the way she’d learnt Kara’s body; how she could drag out her pleasure, or make her explode in minutes.

She bit her lip when a second finger slid inside, needing to stop her hips from rolling down into Lena’s thrusts. “Lena…” Kara whispered, her body trembling in a tantalising mix of pleasure and restraint.

“Not yet,” Lena murmured, very much awake now and rose up to suck Kara’s nipple into her mouth, never ceasing the steady pump of her fingers.

Heat pooled between her legs, and Kara dug her nails into her own thighs to stop from tearing apart the bed, or worse, hurting Lena. She’d already sprained Lena’s wrist once, who wore her brace with an air of sexy arrogance even when they’d had a near month-long argument about safe sex because of that.

“ _Lena_ ,” she hissed in warning, and received only gentle kisses across her face and a devious thumb wetly circling her toward the edge.

Kara whined pitifully and sharp teeth grazed her jaw and nuzzled into her neck.

“Do you want to come for me?”

Kara clenched around her fingers, pulsated, as her body rocked forward and her arms wrapped around Lena, still being painfully careful not to hurt her. “Yes, please let me come for you…”

Seemingly impossibly, Lena sped up her thrusts, her fingers hooking inside Kara with practiced precision.

“Lena…” she moaned into her ear, her body aching and shaking, actual sweat dusting her brow, as her lower belly grew hot and tight.

“ _Divil fah Rao girehn_ ,” Lena rasped and Kara throbbed, her back bowing as the room glowed red.

“ _Zrhueiao dokhahsh_ …” Kara panted into Lena’s hair, eyes squeezed shut and straining to keep up the shallow rocking of her hips while her body adjusted to the lights, “ _khap kyshu rrip vot khap_ …”

_Beautiful demon...I will shower you in me…_

Lena moaned, latched her mouth onto Kara’s neck and sucked.

Kara nearly lost it, trembling while she waited until the mark Lena was making finally hurt. She cried out, slamming her hips down onto Lena's ready fingers, an arm wrapped tightly around her as Kara came, falling into her embrace.

Lena slowly fell back into the pillows, taking Kara along with her and smiled into a messy kiss. Her fingers slowly slid out of Kara who shuddered and groaned when they were replaced with a smooth thigh for her to grind against.

“Better?” Lena asked, stroking through Kara’s hair while the hand that was inside of her rubbed wet, soothing, circles across her hip.

Kara hummed, trying to catch her breath, and cupped Lena’s breast while she squished her cheek against the other.

“It wasn’t about Sam,” she mumbled.

“What was it about then?” Lena asked without ceasing the gentle strokes, like somehow the mind-blowing orgasm was meant to unlock the true reason behind Kara’s insecurity.

“This is the first time I’ve lived with anyone.”

“Me too.”

“Really?” Kara lifted onto her elbows to look into Lena’s face. “I thought you lived with Jack?”

“We didn’t technically live together. We each had our own place where the other spent a lot of time at, but I’ve never officially shared an address with someone I was in a relationship with.” She smiled and Kara did too, until Lena’s face fell. “Do you feel we’re moving too fast?”

“No!” Both of them winced at the volume. “It’s not that. I mean, by the time we started dating it already felt like we’d been dating for years.”

“It did,” Lena agreed and waited for Kara to continue.

“It—I don’t know what it’s supposed to feel like, but it feels so good…for me, to be able to come home to you and sleep in this bed, with you in my arms and I’ve been waiting to freak out about that, but I’m not, and I don’t know if that’s weird or if I’m being delusional, you know?”

Lena smiled. “I know.”

Kara smiled back and then grimaced. “Usually when things feel this good, something bad happens and I guess I took the Sam thing and ran with it because I thought that would be _the_ thing we needed to overcome…”

“Not my brother who’s been missing for the past six months and is possibly stealing hi-tech equipment and devices to most likely kill us all?”

“No,” Kara said and kissed her nose. “Because Lex may be a threat to the world, but he isn’t a threat to our relationship.”

“Neither is Sam,” Lena firmly said and Kara hadn’t realised how much she needed to hear that. Someone else would’ve gotten impatient, maybe even angry at her for being insecure about something that happened in the past. Not Lena. Lena understood.

“Good, I didn’t want to have to fight her for you,” she teased and Lena grinned.

“Oh yes, you’re so _brave_ —” she flatly said and Kara ducked down, kissing Lena’s stomach, making her squirm. “And so _strong_.” She wrapped her legs around Kara’s shoulders wordlessly encouraging her lower. “The entire world should tremble beneath your”—Kara licked through Lena’s slick folds—“ _tongue_ …”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your comments and kudos. Great to see some familiar tags and a few new ones following this mess <3

“ _Divio rahn_ ,” Kara mumbled, smothering a yawn and the red glow in their bedroom faded. Dark blinds were tightly drawn, blocking out the sun and she blinked the sleep from her eyes, grinning stupidly at her sore muscles when she lazily got out of bed.

It had taken a while to voluntarily sleep beneath the red lights, unable to hear people calling for help. She still carried guilt over it, but Alex and Chief of Police Vincent Irons had a great working relationship and he had Supergirl's number in case of emergencies. However hard it was, she’d come to realise that she needed to trust that the police could do their jobs. What helped even more, was knowing that Dreamer, Brainy, Guardian and Alex were on the job too.

The guilt of setting up some boundaries for herself was somewhat overshadowed by having a full-time job that she loved and using that job to expose wrongs after she’d caught the bad guys. In some ways, it felt even more rewarding to be able to offer that type of transparency to the public.

She was a valuable asset to National City, the country, and the world’s defence force. Or so Lena would murmur into her ear, Kara's cheek often squished against her chest, whenever she faltered, or tried to push in some patrolling after a long day of hunting down a lead or fighting an especially bad badguy.

Grabbing a T-Shirt and shorts, she used the bathroom and shuffled through the quiet apartment toward the balcony where the early morning sun made her squint. Her eyes remained open though to take in Lena, already dressed for work and seated outside at the small round table in one of two chairs. She looked up when Kara reached her and accepted the kiss placed on her lips that tasted deliciously of strawberry jam.

“Morning,” Lena greeted with a smile, before going back to scrolling her tablet.

“Good morning,” Kara said through a yawn, stretching out her arms and moaning as the sunlight buzzed through her veins, firing up her synapses like a stimulating drug. She fell into the chair next to Lena and placed her bare feet up on the wall, tilting her head back and basked like a lizard on a rock.

“I made you a hot breakfast with hash browns. It’s in the oven when you’re done recharging.”

Kara hummed, mouth watering and stomach loudly rumbling. “Thank you.”

“Open.”

Kara opened her mouth, eyes still closed and accepted the piece of toast between her teeth. “I love you,” she mumbled around a bite.

“Are you talking to the toast?”

Kara peeked at her through narrowed eyes. “Of course I’m talking to the toast.”

Lena laughed and placed her tablet in the front pouch of her laptop bag and finished her coffee.

“I’m going to be home a bit later tonight.”

“I’ll get us takeout,” Kara offered. “In the mood for anything specific?”

“I’ve been craving naan bread from that Indian place downtown.”

“Yum. I’ll get us some rogan josh and butter chicken,” Kara promised and accepted the kiss she got.

“Stay out of trouble,” Lena replied and walked off.

“Have fun at work!”

She shoved the rest of Lena’s toast in her mouth and closed her eyes again, tilting her face toward the sun. She’d always been afraid of quiet, of being too still. After the Phantom Zone, after learning to deal with the sensory overload of Earth, she’d been drawn to the noise; that unequivocal proof of life.

Sharing the quiet with Lena though, made everything less terrifying. Stripping herself to her very core and having Lena gently explore every single alien part of her was liberating. Kara had thought it was a miracle finding a home with the Danvers, she’d never thought she’d be so lucky again, but Lena had come to feel like home too.

And no matter what lies Sam and Alex liked to tell themselves, _she_ remained Lena's best friend.

***

Kara didn’t like kiwifruit. She didn’t eat them; she didn’t understand them. Whenever she could help it, she avoided them like cats did cucumbers. Lena loved them though, which was why, during her lunchtime grocery run, she stood in the produce aisle staring at all the kiwifruits, wondering how to tell when they were ripe.

Lena usually bought her own, seemingly able to tell which ones to pick by scent alone. Kara noticed that morning that she was out and wanted her to have some for breakfast the next day, knowing if Lena was getting home late she wouldn’t have time to shop later.

Scratching the back of her neck, a basket full of groceries dangling from her forearm, she watched in envy when someone simply reached passed her and selected a few.

About to ask for help, Kara turned and froze beneath the icy blue stare of Lillian Luthor.

“Ms Danvers,” she greeted.

“Ms Luthor,” Kara replied, straightening impulsively.

She couldn’t remember if she’d ever hated a human being as much as she hated Lillian Luthor. Well, it was a toss-up between her and Lex and dependent on Lena’s reaction to their continued mention in her life.

Kara tried to be a good person. To make the right choices. Committing painful acts of violence on someone wasn’t feelings she enjoyed living with. But Lillian sure did bring that ugliness out in her. The only thing that tempered those urges was Kara reminding herself that a big part of her rage was as a result of the actions of another Lillian in another timeline…

They stood glaring at each other and Kara wasn’t sure how to leave the interaction without being rude and then realised she didn’t care, but then remembered she didn’t want to make things difficult for Lena so she stayed under the scrutiny.

“I would like to see my daughter,” Lillian demanded as though Kara was keeping Lena imprisoned.

“That’s something you need to talk to her about.”

“You know she’s avoiding me.”

“Maybe you should take the hint then.”

“I wouldn’t expect an orphan to understand this, but family is important.”

That remark shouldn’t have stung, especially coming from Lillian, but it did for some reason and Kara’s jaw tightened.

“Lena’s happy. You only make her sad.”

Lillian laughed bitterly. “I thought you were the type to advocate for forgiveness.”

“You can’t be trusted.”

“Trusted to what?”

“To not try and use her in some scheme of yours…Or expose her to Lex.”

“You know nothing about my son.”

“Do _you_ know him? Because if you do and you don’t care what a danger he’s always been to Lena, then I’m not going to _advocate for forgiveness_.”

“Lex is gone.”

“You know where he is, don’t you?”

Lillian scoffed. “You know nothing about my family. Why we do what we do and why we are the way we are.”

“I’m not the one who tore your family apart. You did that by playing favourites.”

“My children are the epitome of excellence.”

“Maybe your daughter, but your son is nothing but a psychotic criminal, high on his inherited privilege.”

“Then give my daughter back to me.”

Kara laughed sadly. “Lena makes her own decisions, Ms Luthor. If she’s avoiding you, it’s because she doesn’t want to see you. How long did you really think you could continue to hurt her, before she gave up on you?” Kara shook her head and took Lillian’s kiwifruits from her basket, knowing they would be perfect. “Lena’s the most loyal and loving person I have met in my life and you were stupid enough not to value that,” she said, spun around, and marched to the check-out.

***

“Never thought I would say this about medical equipment, but these tiny ventilators are adorable,” Nia said flipping through the pictures on her tablet, seated on the other side of Kara’s desk at Catco. “And so cheap. Can you believe something that’s so useful and will save so many lives, doesn’t cost an arm and a leg?”

It had been a long time since they’d simply sat down and spoken to each other, or caught up on each other’s lives. Given that both of them were protecting the city and worked at Catco, they often covered for each other, meaning they had little time between relays. And Kara blew her chance at family dinner the night before when she completely freaked out about Sam.

“That should be your story, or at least a follow up on your story.”

“What?”

“Overpriced medical equipment.”

Nia nodded. “That’s why Lena is getting shit from all these associations and manufacturing companies trying to discredit her. Price fixing.”

“A well-known secret for years, but then you get Venture Tech with a boss who’s had to deal with the Luthor’s all her life so she’s not so easily cowed and doesn’t care about making money. They’re going to need to lower their prices in order to compete with her. She’s painted a massive target on her back,” Kara grumbled and placed a long bang behind her ear. Sometimes it felt like Lena’s job was more dangerous than her own these days.

“You should write it.”

Kara pouted. “It’s not fair that I can’t break any Venture Tech stories. It’s like I’m sleeping with her for nothing.”

Nia guffawed, ignoring the curious stares from the bullpen outside the glass office.

“Maybe people will be able to judge the objectivity of the article.”

“Ugh, everyone knows we’re dating. She doesn’t deserve for people to dismiss the news celebrating their achievements with accusations of bias. Which there will be no matter how objectively I write.”

“Blog about it anonymously. At least you can get it out of your system and I can cite you instead of shamelessly stealing your ideas.”

“I don’t mind. This is great news. Alex is even more excited than Lena.”

“I’m interviewing her too.”

“Good luck with that. She slams up the instant you try and get information out of her. Like some leftover D.E.O. conditioning or something. You’re gonna need to determine whether their equipment is that cheap because of the technology they make themselves, and their competitors might simply not be able to manufacture at the same low price.”

Nia groaned. “I remember she did the same when the cancer trial started. I got nothing. I still know nothing even when she and Lena discuss it right in front of me. No number of cases, no length of the trial, not even a hint as to the _how_. I realise it’s top-secret stuff, but come on!”

Kara laughed. “Looks like I’m better off simply not writing about Venture Tech.”

“Definitely not the R&D department.” Nia pouted. “At least Brainy’s in security, even though he likes to spend his time down there in the chamber of secrets.”

Kara grinned. “Things seem to be going well between you two.”

“Yeah, we’re taking it slow. He’s still unnecessarily careful and feeling unfairly guilty.”

“He never did anything criminal, but I guess he feels he betrayed us by siding with Lex for a little while. I hope he understands that we know he was trying to do good.”

“He knows. He’s so hard on himself when it comes to what he feels is right. I’m just happy to have him back on our side. If I’d known it would take Lena branching out on her own to convince him to join her, I would’ve gotten a loan from the bank to throw my money at her in hopes she’d do it sooner.”

“Lena’s so happy to have him back…” Kara said, her chest expanding. “And he did mention what great things her company had done in his future.”

“Yeah, I think he found a lot of comfort in the fact that at least that part of the future might remain the same. You and your wife are going down in history.”

“Please don’t even joke about that.”

“About Lena being your wife?”

“ _Shush_! And yes, this isn’t the Catco it used to be. They’ll sooner put Lena Luthor, sister of missing Nobel prize winner gets married as a main story, than Lena Luthor saves literal lives with her massive brain. They’re like vultures digging into her personal life all the time under the guise of being interested in her grounbreaking innovations. They won’t even care that you were obviously joking. Anything for clicks.”

“Getting tired of being in the tabloids?”

“It’s so cringy seeing myself like that, and its nerve-wracking worrying when there’ll be an article with me on one page next to a picture of Supergirl on the other. And how long will it really take for someone to make a look-alike joke and another to take a closer look if only to prove them wrong…”

“Yeah, at least Lex hasn’t outed you yet.”

“The longer he’s missing, the more I feel this impending sense of doom that he’ll do exactly that when he does resurface,” Kara said. “I can’t let him ruin what we have. All of us. Things are good now, you know?”

Nia nodded. “Is that what had you so worried last night?”

Kara groaned softly and smiled. “No, I was just being silly…” She trailed off and frowned, because a steady murmur rose from the room outside and buzzed in her ears. People stared at the television monitors mounted against various walls that broadcasted live news all day. Kara tuned her hearing to listen to the reports playing.

Slowly getting to her feet, stomach filling with dread, she exited her office, transfixed on the footage where a news chopper filmed Lena standing on a rooftop, face pulled into a sneer while she glared down her brother. His hands were up in surrender, dressed in a rumpled business suit and a look of fake fear on his bruised and dirtied face. Fake because she—unfortunately—knew too much about Lex Luthor.

But then Kara froze and sounds grew muffled as she took in the length of Lena’s hair, loose and long and dark, falling all the way to her tailbone whipping around her head in the wind. The strands were curling in a way that would suggest she’d had them tightly pinned at some point.

Her crinkled black military style outfit hugged a slender, sinewy frame. Her jawline was impossibly sharper, green eyes glinting with malice and an old scar was slashed across her left brow, over the eye, stopping at the apple of her cheek.

Kara’s chest ached and her eyes burned, heart throbbing in her throat and she watched as seemingly in slow motion, Nia violently shoved a metallic paper tray off of a desk. It clattered to the floor while Nia loudly apologised, drawing curious eyes away from Kara, who sped out of the room, not caring how strange they would find her sudden disappearance.

***

The few seconds it took to reach the rooftop felt like an eternity. Kara saw them on her approach, the way Lena moved like a cat as she fought Lex, grossly outmatching him in the physical bout. Lena, love of her life, mother of her future terribly named children, wasn't exactly known for her physicality. She had the upper-hand and still, when Lex teetered on the edge of the building, Lena flew at him, Kara heard her angry scream, saw her total disregard for her own life as she grabbed the front of Lex’s shirt and pushed them both over the ledge of the skyscraper.

“ _No!_ ” Kara screamed, pushing her body forward and snatched Lena out of the sky who instantly began to struggle in her arms. Kara lost her grip, her brain growing hazy before a shot of kryptnite knocked her away and Lena’s body continued hurtling to the ground.

“Lena, stop!” she yelled and pushed through the pain to grab Lena again, wrapped herself around her body and propelled them through the air, protectively cradling her as they crashed atop the rooftop of a shorter building.

Gently releasing Lena to lay on the ground, Kara clumsily rolled away to escape the poison blurring her vision and making her lightheaded, but Lena lithely shot up onto her feet, and a constant beam of kryptonite shot from her chest, pinning Kara to the ground.

The pain was excruciating, burning through her veins and seeming to congregate in her neck, hotly squeezing as a blinding white light throbbed behind her eyes.

“Lena…” she croaked, pleading for some recognition. “It’s me…Kara…”

“I don’t care what your name—,” Lena’s growl was cut off by a green beam that hit her side and sent her rolling across the rooftop until she limply came to a stop on her side.

Kara heard the familiar sound of Lena’s mech suit gathering energy for its next blast and shot across the rooftop, shielding Other Lena’s body with her own, just in time. The blast hit her back and still it didn’t hurt nearly as much as the kryptonite burning her front.

Lena softly landed on the rooftop with a gentle click of hydraulics that usually evoked a Pavlovian response of pure joy. Now though, Kara angrily whipped around to face her.

“Are you crazy!” she shouted at the green slit staring back at her. “She’s sick! You could’ve killed her!”

She received no answer, and with Lena now unconscious, the kryptonite was at least at tolerable levels so she gently gathered her in her arms.

“Lena?” she softly asked.

She looked older and despite the muscle gain, there was something frail about her.

Kara stared at her for a long moment, heart hammering, unsure why she was so certain that it was the Lena from the alternate timeline. She brushed the long hair from her face, tracing the scar across her eye. If she didn’t have it when Kara left her, would she have gotten it after? Which meant she was a few years from the point in time Kara had travelled to. But then why didn’t she remember Kara? And why did that world continue to exist when Mxy had told her it wouldn’t? Or she could be from another timeline, another world, or another dimension...

The kryptonite burnt her fingers and while she watched the long strand of dark hair drag through them, she caught a glimpse of her watch and nearly facepalmed.

She carefully laid Lena back on the ground and touched the face of the wristwatch, her anti-kryptonite suit quickly covering her body. Lena had converted it to mimic the nano-tech of her own suit and the watch changed colours with Kara’s supersuit, so she could wear it as Kara too, without people noticing. The only reason she didn’t always use it, was because it dampened her powers considerably.

Sheepishly, she looked to where her Lena had been, readying for a snide remark on how she’d forgotten to use her suit when she was being blasted by kryptonite, but the rooftop was empty.

Other Lena groaned and a lump grew in Kara’s throat at the pure hatred plainly noticeable even through her drowsiness.

“I killed you,” Lena hissed, her hands coming up in an attempt to possibly do some harm, but the second Lena lifted herself, she instantly fell back into Kara’s waiting arms.

Chest and eyes burning, Kara gently cradled her to her chest and flew out of sight of the news chopper lights still shining down on them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> @NotSoEvilPanda


	3. Chapter 3

Relieved to find Alex and Kelly already waiting for her at The Tower, with a hospital bed prepped and ready, she carefully laid Lena down, brushed a strand of hair out of her face and reluctantly stood back to give Alex room to work. Already tightly coiled with fear and tension, she startled when gentle fingers cupped her elbow and allowed Kelly to lead her out of the room, because she couldn’t bear seeing what they’d done to Lena.

The minutes dragged on at a snail’s pace and near an hour later, Alex exited the room and Kara stopped pacing.

“The scars on her body…” Alex rasped, eyes glistening.

Kara gave a stiff nod.

“She has fresh bruises, a day or two old.”

Kara’s fists clenched.

“She hasn’t eaten in several days and is severely dehydrated.”

“Will she be okay, Alex?”

“We need to get her to a hospital. I don’t have the equipment here to test and treat her properly.”

“We can’t take her to a hospital,” Kara whispered, all three of them staring through the open door at the glow of kryptonite on Lena’s chest, knowing full well what it would mean for ‘Lena Luthor’ to be admitted to a hospital in that condition. Kara also wasn’t sure that the hospital would survive Lena waking up in it.

“Maybe we should take her to your apartment,” Kelly said. “So the red lights can neutralise her kryptonite.”

“Then I’ll go to the lab and pick up a few things from work,” Alex agreed.

“No, we can take her to Lena’s private lab. She’ll be safer there and you’ll have ease of access to the medical equipment you need.”

“Okay…” Alex carefully agreed. “I’m going to give her a sedative first, though.”

Kara frowned. “Why?”

“To make sure she doesn’t wake up in transit and kill you, but also to help her body rest while it heals.”

Kara nodded her consent, and once Lena was ready for transport, Alex and Kelly shared a long look but didn’t comment when Kara carefully picked her up to fly her to Venture Tech.

***

She landed on the heliport on the rooftop and used the biometrics scanner to call for Lena’s private elevator that took her down to the sub-basement floor. After laying Lena down, she went to fetch Alex and Kelly once they arrived via car, and anxiously stood aside while they took in the state-of-the-art lab, eyebrows raising at the small studio apartment through the door at the back.

Alex made eye contact and Kara flushed so hard her head nearly exploded.

“So this is where you two disappear to when you help Lena _work_ …”

“I actually do help her sometimes,” she mumbled. “But mostly, when she’s working late and in the zone, I just come sleep here and she joins me when she’s done. So we can sleep. Together. Not in a sex way. Not always…We just sleep better together.”

“Aw,” Kelly cooed and Kara blushed harder. “This is a private place though, Kara, are you sure Lena will be okay with us being here?”

“I guess I don’t have much of a choice,” Lena said, stepping out of the storage room and everyone stiffened. “Oh, so very sorry to surprise you all, in this secret space I created for myself,” she remarked. “I did go home, but it was swamped with journalists, police and a variety of government officials attempting to arrest me. As is my place of work, so I’m stuck in here for the time being.”

“I’ll speak to Chief Irons,” Alex said, “get him to call his guys off and Lucy should be able to help us come up with a cover story that will get the rest off our backs until we figure out what’s going on. A picture of the two of you together should calm them down a little.”

“Thank you,” Lena said and Kara was painfully aware of how meticulously she was being ignored. “News reports are stating Supergirl and I killed my brother.”

“ _What_?” Kara exclaimed. Lena didn’t even acknowledge her and Kelly and Alex seemed to want the ground to swallow them whole.

“We’ll need to keep her secured,” Lena said. “The kryptonite may be disabled here, but she’s still dangerous.”

“You can’t restrain her,” Kara said.

Lena looked to Alex. “I’ll set up the containment unit I used for Reign.”

Alex nodded.

“I went to look for Lex,” she continued and Kara’s heart stuttered, she hadn’t even thought of trying to save him too. “There was no body on the ground.”

“ _What?_ ” Kara and Alex exclaimed.

“There was a lot of blood, and there’s no way he would’ve been able to get up from a fall like that. Someone likely took the body for whatever reason.”

“I’ll go with Nia and investigate the site where Lex fell,” Kelly said. “I’ll try to get Chief Irons to give us a copy of the forensics report and collect some blood samples so we can see if it even was Lex on that rooftop.”

“Come find me after,” Alex said. “I’ll go call Irons and Lucy now, maybe Nia can help with writing the cover-up.”

Kelly nodded and left while Lena entered her storage room again. Kara slowly turned to look at Alex.

“That,” Alex whispered, pointing in Lena’s direction, “is not because we’re here. What did you do?”

Kara crossed her arms over her chest and hung her head. “I may have shouted at her…”

“Hardly seems like something she’ll get that upset about.”

“I shouted at her for trying to hurt…Lena…”

“Is she—is she the one you were with when Mxy took you back in time?”

“I don’t know. It feels like it’s her, but she didn’t recognise me and Mxy wouldn’t do that and how would she have gotten here?”

Lena walked back out, carrying a metallic case she placed on a counter.

“Listen, let me go appease the authorities and then I’ll come back and get her settled and we can talk to her when she wakes up, okay?”

Kara nodded and after Alex left, she watched Lena carry a couple of long thin pylons from the storage room.

“Lena—”

“No.”

Unsurprised, Kara bit her lip.

Breasts, unfortunately, hardly ever worked on Lena. They figured it out though, in the end. Always. Once they managed to get to the point where they could actually talk.

She dragged her feet to the small apartment. The actual lab was three times its size. It wasn’t cramped by any means; the lab was just that big. The kitchen, living room and bedroom area were open plan, with a shower and toilet at the back.

Filling a large mixing bowl with warm water, Kara fetched the container of liquid soap from the shower and grabbed a new washcloth carrying the items over to the queen-sized bed Other Lena laid on.

Her fingers shook as she carefully unbuttoned Lena’s uniform and gently stripped her bare. She set about cleaning her body in a daze, tears blurring her eyes over each new bruise and scar, her ears tuned to the unnaturally slow and achingly familiar metallic _thu-thunk_ in Lena’s chest.

She wished she could wash her hair too, but Kara settled on gently brushing it, awed by how long it was. The elevator dinged and she looked up, surprised to see Lena standing near the foot of the bed, brows creased and a pained expression on her face as her eyes rapidly skidded across the scars and burn marks on Other Lena’s body.

Alex walked through the door and Kara quickly covered Lena with a sheet, looking up again to find green eyes staring directly into her.

“Should be okay to go home now,” Alex said, and Lena broke the intense stare as she turned to her. “Sam’s upstairs to take you home.”

“Thanks, Alex.”

“I’ll call you later, okay?”

“Okay,” Lena nodded and left the lab.

“We’re going to push a narrative of clone or robot and have the public speculate about that instead of wondering about it actually being our Lena,” Alex said. “Chief Irons will arrange for a police blockade in the morning and Lena will make a statement that she was at work during the entire thing. Jess and Sam will corroborate her story. Nia will write an article about the differences in body weight and the length of her hair, the scar on her face and the obvious kryptonite shooting from her body, to differentiate them. Randoms on social media have already examined each frame of the news clip and have been saying as much already. Kelly’s examining the blood she collected for a match to the sample of Lex’s DNA Lena had on file...”

“Did any portals open?” Kara asked, gaze fixed on the way Lena’s brows twitched, as though she was dreaming.

“Brainy didn’t pick up on anything. With Darkseid as a possible threat, he wouldn’t have slacked his surveillance. He and Lena even had alarms set up for fifth-dimensional magic, which I didn’t know about, but good on them.”

“Nothing?”

“Nothing.”

Kara sighed. “I guess we’ll need to wait for her to wake up and tell us how she got there.” She smiled and gently ran the back of her fingers across Lena’s cheek.

“You need to go home, Kara.”

“I need to be here when she wakes up.”

“You need to go speak to your girlfriend who left here looking very upset.”

Kara nodded. She was very aware of that, but also knew that what her girlfriend needed right now was space.

“I need you to go get her uniform cleaned, please,” she requested, gathering Lena’s mass of hair into her hands.

“I’ll be staying here with her,” Alex replied. “She won’t be up before at least 8am tomorrow and if she wakes up sooner, you’ll be the first person I call.”

“She needs to be wearing her uniform when she wakes up, Alex, please,” Kara whispered, focused on her trembling fingers threading a long French braid over Lena’s shoulder. She wouldn’t know how to begin to pin it the way Lena liked to wear it.

“Kara—”

“I’ll move her to the containment unit myself. Set up her IV and hook her up to the heart and saturation monitors. I’ll wait for you to come back with her cleaned and pressed uniform, dress her and then go home,” she firmly stated, focused on her braiding, but could feel Alex’s stare as the silence stretched between them.

Finally, Alex moved to pick up the uniform. “I’ll call Lena while I’m out.”

“Thanks, Alex.”

***

Later that night, Kara made her way home at a human pace, going by Catco to collect her bag, laptop, and the few groceries she’d bought that afternoon, stopping by Bhukkara to pick up the order of Indian food Lena had requested. Her interaction with Lillian that afternoon seemed like a lifetime ago and Kara wondered now whether the encounter had been a coincidence or not. Lillian was many things, but stupid enough to draw attention to herself for the sake of trying to intimidate Kara, wasn’t something she would do if it also risked implicating herself in a crime.

There was one news van down the block, the occupants of which didn’t harass her when she passed by, which meant they were simply being thorough and had no plans to invade their privacy for at least that evening. The robot versus clone debate had everyone keeping busy trying to come up with the answer first. Renewed interested in the person in the black armour had also sparked. Lena usually helped in the background when needed, and has had too few public appearances for them to have named her yet, but that day was certainly enough of a high-profile incident for them to talk about her appearance as much as Lex, Lena and Supergirl’s.

Kara would trust Alex though, to tell them how to handle it. She really was a master at misdirection, keeping them out of trouble and was the only thing preventing them from going from heroes to vigilantes. She’d really come into her own after J’onn had retired to Mars.

Their apartment was quiet and Kara softly set about packing away the groceries, not wanting to listen, but unable to help herself, and extended her senses to find Lena. Her heart sunk into her stomach when she heard the rapid heartbeat coming from their guest room.

Lena was terrified of rejection. Of abandonment. It took some painful arguments to get there, but they were both aware of how, when Lena felt scared or threatened, she clamped up and when Kara pushed, she pushed right back and that never got them anywhere. What Lena needed was to know that Kara wasn’t going to leave the second she made a mistake. That Kara wouldn’t laud things over her to manipulate her feelings. That Lena was very welcome to have strong reactions and emotions in their relationship, and that Kara accepted that she sometimes went to a dark place when her defences were up.

She scanned the kitchen and saw no signs that Lena had eaten anything and the naan bread would not be the same in the morning. Going to ask Lena if she still wanted some would be the worst idea, though. She wouldn’t have hidden herself away if she was in a headspace to talk. So Kara set about cutting up some fruit and sealing it away in a container she placed in the fridge for easy access when Lena felt like eating.

She walked over to the coffee table in their living room and sat down on the carpet, staring at the tiny bonsai tree that everyone close to her knew the importance of. Already close to tears of guilt for her-Lena and worry for the one locked up at Venture Tech, Kara’s mood flipped entirely when she heard a familiar rustle of fabric from outside. She’d been so caught up in her own emotions, she wasn’t sure how long their apartment was being surveyed.

Careful to be quiet and not alarm Lena, she dawned her suit and shot out the balcony, speeding up and up until she was above the clouds and out of sight of the city.

Her uninvited guest got the message and joined her soon after.

“Kal,” she said and crossed her arms over her chest while they hovered opposite each other.

“Kara,” he replied, brows creased in earnest as he stared down through the clouds, no doubt checking that she wasn’t an attempt at diversion.

“Lois and Jonathan all right?”

He absently nodded and dragged his gaze to her. “You need to hand her over to the police.”

“You need to go home to your wife and child.”

“Look, I know last time we spoke, it got a little heated—”

“A little heated? You showed up at the Fortress and attacked my girlfriend for no reason.”

“She nearly killed me!”

“You knew she and I were together and still you attacked her unprovoked, without question, and then want to get angry that she defended herself?”

“How was I supposed to know you’d given her free reign to examine our history and culture?”

“You mean like I know everything you share with Lois?”

“You know Lois can be trusted.”

“How do I know that?”

“Because you know her.”

“No. I don’t know her. I barely know you. But I gave you my trust because we’re family and by extension I trusted your judgement in who you shared information with about our people.”

“Lois isn’t a Luthor.”

“No. She’s a Lane. Daughter of a known xenophobe who hates my guts. But unlike you, I don't hold people’s names against them.”

“Kara, you have to understand where I'm coming from.”

“No. I don't have to understand a thing. _You,_ need to go home.”

“I watched her push her brother off of a roof.”

“If only you showed as much interest in bringing Lex to justice as you do going after everyone else who has access to kryptonite. That’s why you’re here, right? Because of the weapon in her chest?”

He clenched his jaw and looked away.

“Did you maybe notice the lack of kryptonite in our home?”

“She must be hiding it.”

“In her chest? And I’m just walking around it? Living with it? Sleeping next to it? Until Lena decided to surprise me today by publicly killing her brother and attacking me?”

“I’m still investigating—”

“No. You're not needed here. You didn’t bat an eye when Lex set up shop in National City. You’ve been fine with him being _my_ problem for years.”

“I wasn’t on Earth.”

“You’ve been enjoying your family for over a year without worrying about Lex Luthor and the kryptonite he has access to. You don’t get to show up here now.”

“Kara, she makes kryptonite like college students make ramen.”

“And we can crush humans with nary a thought, yet they don’t demand we permanently blow out our powers so they can feel safer that we won’t hurt them someday.”

“It’s not the same.”

“Why? Because you’re the pinnacle of virtue and control and never make any mistakes? Because you can’t and haven’t been influenced by outside forces?”

“I can’t trust a Luthor with kryptonite, especially not after what I saw on the news today.”

“ _Kal_ ,” she quietly seethed. “I swear, on the names of every member of the House of El; on Rao’s Light from beneath which all life grows and flourishes, that if you come anywhere near Lena, if you stalk her, and especially if you corner and interrogate her, I won’t stop her when she hurts you back this time.”

He deflated entirely. Lena had said she’d forgiven him the misunderstanding at the Fortress. Kara suspected though, she did it because Clark was family. She’d forgiven him for Kara. Or maybe Lena was just used to being mistrusted and accused. The thought made bile rise in her throat.

“I’m going to choose to trust you on this,” he announced. “For now.”

“And I’m going to choose to ignore the fact that you lurked outside my home, spied on the woman I love, and invaded our privacy, instead of simply calling me and asking me what was going on,” she said and dived back down to the apartment, before things really turned ugly.


	4. Chapter 4

Kara barely slept. The bed felt unnaturally large and empty, and her thoughts kept shifting between Lena down the hall and Lena in the containment unit at Venture Tech, her need to offer them both comfort, weighing heavy on her chest.

In the morning, she pretended to be asleep when Lena entered their room to quietly gather some clothes. Once she left, Kara rolled onto her back and listened to her getting dressed in the guest room, before her heels clicked toward the kitchen.

She smiled softly when the container of fruit was removed and she could imagine Lena popping pieces into her mouth while she busied herself cooking. It was only when she heard Lena close the dishwasher that she quietly slunk into the living room.

“Morning,” she said, sitting down at the kitchen island.

“Morning,” Lena replied and placed a plate of scrambled eggs and toast in front of her. She then gathered her laptop and handbag and Kara picked up her fork, but paused when Lena walked up and stood beside her.

“I need to go do the press conference…”

Kara nodded. “I’ll be close.”

“I’ll join you and Alex afterward to speak to her.”

“Okay. I’ll wait for you. We’ll do it together.”

Lena’s shoulders loosened. “Thank you, Kara,” she softly said and pressed a tender kiss to Kara’s temple that she all but fell into. Her eyes fluttered closed and she basked in the subtle notes of Lena’s perfume, the warmth of the hand that gently squeezed her bicep, and only opened them again when the door to their apartment quietly shut.

***

“Short of opening my shirt and flashing all of you, I doubt there’s much more I can do to prove that it wasn’t me, and certainly not my brother, brawling on that rooftop yesterday afternoon.”

Kara hovered in the sky, watching as the press laughed in delight, cameras clicking away where Lena addressed them from behind a podium on the front steps of Venture Tech. And it was that snark and mischievous smile that made them salivate over Lena’s private life. Her sense of style alone was a near-weekly feature in Catco and various other media fashion segments around the country.

She was immensely popular, and they loved and hated on her with equal parts passion.

“I’m certain that Supergirl is working with authorities to try and ascertain why anyone would seek to copy me—”

“Why wouldn’t they, Dr. Luthor?!” A man shouted from the crowd and Lena smiled demurely. They ate it up even when Kara knew Lena was simply performing for them. They didn’t get her real smiles. They wouldn’t survive those.

“I’m as impatient as you are to get to the bottom of this and have given my full cooperation to local authorities, as Chief Irons stated earlier this morning. The NCPD is working around the clock to find those responsible for this very cruel diversion when my brother is still missing. I appreciate your discretion and continued respect of my privacy during this time. Thank you,” she said and despite a chorus of questions being immediately shouted at her, Lena turned away and there was Sam, hand protectively resting on her lower back, opening the door for her and guiding her into Venture Tech.

Kara gritted her teeth and used the rooftop elevator again, riding down to the lobby where Lena got in, surprisingly on her own.

“Sam’s not coming?”

“She’s helping Jess keep ahead of this disaster,” Lena said as the elevator took them down. “She’ll stop by later. I’ve granted her access so she can help Alex when we aren’t available.”

Kara nodded.

“I’m surprised Superman’s alter-ego didn’t show up at the press conference to interrogate me.”

Kara sighed. “How’d you know?”

“Brainy told me our surveillance picked up on him flying around National City last night. Near our home.”

Kara bit her lip. “I took care of it.”

Lena accepted it with a nod and they fell into silence, Kara watching the elevator buttons, anxiously waiting to reach their destination. It had been all she could do to not go to the private lab on her own that morning. Alex had messaged the group chat that Lena’s vitals were looking great and that she would join them in the lab after she finished supervising that day’s roster of cancer trial patients.

The doors dinged open and she startled at the sound, her heart painfully thudding in anticipation. She fell into step beside Lena, and couldn’t help but audibly gasp when she saw Other Lena standing upright behind the forcefield of the containment unit. Her hands were folded behind her back, the scar across her eye making her look even more intimidating, despite the softness of Kara’s braid falling over a squared shoulder and resting against a pressed uniform top.

Kara had dressed her the evening before, something settling inside of her once she was certain Lena was as put together as she could possibly get while unconscious.

The Lenas locked eyes and Kara was afraid to move while they scoped each other out. It was all so very surreal. A fever dream come to life.

“Where am I?” Other Lena husked; voice thick from disuse.

“Earth-Prime,” Lena answered. “What year is it?”

Other Lena frowned and Kara could practically see her file away questions about the prime in Earth-Prime. “2020,” she decided to answer.

“Here too,” Lena said. “How did you get here?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t?” Kara asked and both of them sent her identical sharp looks and she sighed, crossing her arms over her chest, having to consciously pull back her pouting bottom lip before it was remarked on.

 _Fine._ It was probably for the best that Lena handled herself right now.

“I woke up in a white, nondescript room, restrained to a chair by electronic cuffs I didn’t recognise the make of.”

“Where were you before that?”

“In bed. In my home.”

“Do you know how long you were held there?”

“It felt like weeks, might’ve only been days though, judging by how hungry I got and how I didn’t die of starvation. I can’t say for certain as the lights were always on and there were no windows.”

Lena nodded. “Did you see anyone?”

Other Lena shifted on her feet and Kara clenched her fists, trying to keep from going to her.

“They wore masks. Cargo pants and t-shirts. Plain black. Polycotton. No logos. At least four different white males.”

“Alex didn’t find anything, but do you require us to provide you with any contraceptive or preventative measures to combat any injuries sustained during your captivity?”

It took a while for Kara to figure out what Lena was asking, but when she did her stomach rolled and then her anger raged. She was grateful for the red lights making it possible for her to dig her nails into her own arms so she could focus on the pain while she waited for Other Lena’s answer.

Which came in the form of her tilting her head, green eyes calculating as they flicked between them.

“They only hit me.”

Kara released a breath and then immediately tensed because they had _hit_ her. And she was going to _kill_ Lex. What kind of person puts his own sister through something like that?

“How did you get on the rooftop with Lex?” Lena asked.

“They sedated me. When I woke up, I was on the roof. Lex said he orchestrated my kidnapping from my world and was responsible for the _hospitality_ I received during my captivity.”

“He told you that you were from another world?”

“No, I inferred as much since I killed him very thoroughly in mine.”

“And you were sure that it was him on the roof with you?”

“Positive.”

Lena swallowed thickly. “We couldn’t find his body…Do you think any of that was staged?”

“Of course it was. Why wouldn’t he have me secured? Why wasn’t he armed? Why were we on a god-damned rooftop?”

“If he got you from another world,” Kara said, “he could’ve gotten a version of himself too.”

She ignored Other Lena’s malicious glare, because her Lena looked at her and nodded. “Could be, though I doubt any version of Lex would be selfless enough to sacrifice himself.”

“Might’ve been tricked into believing he wouldn’t die,” Other Lena said. “Why are you working with her?”

“With Supergirl?”

Rao, the look she directed at Kara made her feel one inch tall. “Yes. _Her_.”

“Why does it matter to you?”

“She’s a murderer.”

“You just admitted to killing Lex.”

“Yes. And I killed her friend that dressed up in the powder blue suit too.” Kara’s head snapped up. “And the one with the shield. The other one with the short hair and the motorcycle.”

Kara’s heart hammered. “No…” she whispered.

“I made her watch me kill all of her little friends, before I killed her too.”

Lena looked sick and Other Lena glared at them both.

“Supergirl took the only good thing I had left in the world, so I took everything from her too.”

“Do you expect me to release you after that?” Lena hoarsely asked.

“I’ve learned not to expect anything from anyone.”

“So you're happy to stay in there?”

“Do I look as though I care what happens to me? Being around Supergirl has really influenced your brain, _Lena_. Are you sleeping with her?”

She seemed to have meant it as a joke and Kara wasn’t sure what she saw on Lena’s face who’d barely reacted to the question, but Other Lena looked as nauseous as Lena had before and Kara wanted to crawl into a tiny hole and die.

“That’s none of your business,” Lena said as the elevator arrived and Alex stepped out, worriedly taking in the pained looks on all their faces.

***

The soundproofing on the containment unit was activated, and the three of them moved to the apartment to talk. Kara had, for some reason, positioned herself directly in Other Lena’s line of sight, who stared at her through the doorway with cold eyes, still rigidly standing with her hands behind her back, like she wasn’t still weak from multiple days of torture and starvation.

“So, she’s been of no help,” Alex concluded after Lena finished telling her what was said.

“She’s so angry,” Lena incredulously said. “I thought I’ve been angry before, but that…”

Alex took Lena’s hand. “Do you think we should keep her locked up? I doubt that’ll ingratiate her to us any further.”

“She’s a murderer,” Lena said, pulling her hand back to her body. “She hates Kara and she looks as though she wouldn’t think twice about attacking her again.”

“The people she murdered are all alive here, and should we hold it against her—” Kara was cut off by Lena’s incredulous glare.

“Whether she murdered people here or on eighth-dimensional Mars, she’s still a killer and she didn’t show an ounce of remorse.”

“I don’t think,” Kara softly said, “that you would ever kill someone without very good reason, and if your life wasn’t at risk too.”

“Kara, she confessed to hunting down all of your friends and killing them one by one, to spite you. She is _not_ me. You can’t reason that away using me as a frame of reference. From what we’ve seen from her thus far, she might as well be a stranger.”

“She’s not. You’re still in there—”

“She’s also not that woman on the flashdrive if that’s why you’re not using your brain when considering this situation.”

Alex awkwardly cleared her throat and Kara grinded her teeth. “You’re the one judging her for supposed actions she committed and not looking at her for the person she is.”

“I’m listening to the words she’s telling me with her mouth and looking at a murderer who has proudly admitted to _killing_ you.”

She prepared herself to argue, not sure why she felt a need to defend Other Lena when she agreed they should be cautious. She just didn’t like the immediate conclusion that Other Lena was bad and should be treated as such. But then she heard the elevator doors ding open, absently looked out the door, and her stomach knotted when she watched Other Lena blanch. Mouth agape, she removed her hands from her back and placed her palms against the forcefield, eyes wide and watery, looking so abruptly vulnerable it made Kara’s chest hurt.

She mechanically walked toward her, hearing Lena and Alex follow, but froze outside the apartment door, staring at Sam, who was awkwardly staring at Other Lena who had tears streaming down her face.

“ _Sam_?” Kara could see the way Sam’s name fell from her lips like a whisper. Lena shook like a leaf, her eyes fixed on Sam, who walked forward and slowly pressed her palm against the forcefield over Lena’s, who smiled brilliantly even as she let out a sob, openly crying as she leaned her forehead against the barrier and seemed to simply look at Sam.

The forcefield shimmered and disappeared, Kara’s head snapped toward Alex, then back to where Other Lena swiftly moved, throwing her arms around Sam, loudly weeping into her neck. Sam had thankfully caught her in time and held her back tightly, even as she sent them all a questioning look.

She tenderly rubbed Lena’s back who seemed to lose all function in her legs and Sam was forced to go down with her as she tiredly sat on the ground still clinging to her.

“We need to get you back in bed,” Alex said, but didn’t move from where she carefully watched them, one hand near the Taser gun on her hip, the other holding a tablet computer. “Your body needs more rest and nutrients.”

Other Lena only stared up at Sam, reverently touching her face. “I watched you die,” she gruffly whispered. “I know you’re not her, but I watched them kill you, Sammy.”

Kara softly gasped, dread filling her stomach.

“They trapped you like an animal. I told them I had a way to save you, but they wouldn’t listen. They held me back while she used a fucking glowing rock and you were _gone_.”

Sam’s breath hitched and a lump grew in Kara’s throat.

“I finally finished the black kryptonite,” Lena mumbled, eyes blinking drowsily. “I was going to save you. I promised Ruby…I _promised._ ”

Sam let out a sob and pulled Lena closer.

“’was gonna save you…” Lena dazedly mumbled, before she lost consciousness entirely.

***

Sam was visibly shaken, seated in one of the four chairs around the small round kitchen table in the apartment. Kara and Lena sat on either side of her, staring at the tabletop. All three heads raised when Alex joined them, closing the door behind her and shielding their view of where an unconscious Lena lay, hooked up to a new drip as she’d stubbornly pulled out the previous one that morning.

“I knocked her out again so she can get some rest,” Alex said, sitting down at the table and running a hand through her hair. “She collapsed from exhaustion.”

“You sure?” Sam asked. “Because I have that effect on women…”

Alex and Lena each snorted out a tired laugh, but Kara only glared at them until they sobered and the tension settled heavily around the table again.

“So,” Alex said, “I’m gonna go ahead and assume that she was working on a way to split Sam and Reign, but before she could use it, we captured Reign and…”

“Killed her,” Kara finished, stomach swirling unpleasantly. “I can’t believe I did that.”

“If Reign was as bad there as she was here, it’s not like Supergirl was given much of a choice,” Sam said.

Kara shook her head. “So it’s okay for me to kill Reign because she’s a bad guy, but not for her to kill bad guys because they’re bad guys?”

“She was very rigid in her beliefs and extreme when it came to what constituted bad,” Sam said. “She executed people without remorse or much consideration. She wasn’t a simple bad guy, Kara.”

“How can you defend what I did?” Kara asked. “You of all people. I remember the way that Lena was when I met her. She still had hope. She was still trying to do what was right to the best of her abilities. She would’ve split you from Reign, no doubt about it. You were literally all she had left and what did I do? Crushed the last connection she had to the world by the sound of it, right in front of her face without even listening to what she had to say.”

“We don’t know that she’s the same person you met,” Lena quietly said.

“I know it’s her,” Kara confidently replied. She wasn’t sure how or what made her so certain, but she just knew.

No one contradicted her and they all fell silent again until Alex spoke up.

“I’ll go check in with the police. She’ll be knocked out until tomorrow,” she said and stood.

“Is it okay if I came back tomorrow?” Sam asked, eyes flitting between the three of them, seemingly uncertain who to ask for that permission but then settled on Lena, who nodded.

“You’re the only person she seems to have known in her world. I think she’ll be calmer and more cooperative with you around.”

Sam smiled and Lena returned it and Kara dizzily rose to her feet. “I’m gonna go check in with Brainy and Nia,” she mumbled and hurried out the door.

***

Lena was already home when Kara got back later that night. She’d texted that she was working late at the office and Lena replied that dinner was in the fridge. She quietly moved throughout the house, ate, showered in the guest bathroom, and walked naked into the bedroom where she knew Lena was awake.

She didn’t bother with any clothes and got in under the covers, laying on her side to face and equally and unsurprisingly naked Lena.

No super-hearing was needed to hear the sound of Lena thickly swallowing, before she reached out between them and Kara made sure her palm was open so Lena could take her hand, pulling it toward her chest and pressed it to her rapidly beating heart.

They shifted closer, foreheads nearly touching and their clasped hands between them.

“I’m sorry,” Lena whispered. “I shouldn’t have shut you out.”

“It’s okay. I shouldn’t have shouted at you,” she replied. “I’m sorry too.”

“She was hurting you, Kara…I saw myself hurting you with _kryptonite_.”

Kara nodded, knowing the guilt Lena still carried about that awful time they were fighting before Earth-Prime was created.

“I shouted because you—she—was badly hurt. Everything’s really confusing right now.”

Lena nodded and pressed a kiss to her knuckles and Kara kissed her forehead, just wanting to hold her tightly as she’d been craving to do since this whole mess started.

“I would’ve done anything to stop her from hurting you,” Lena said. “And I felt betrayed when you defended her after she’d attacked you.”

“I would defend you no matter the timeline or dimension. Even from yourself.”

“Some things aren't forgivable, Kara,” Lena murmured. “I’m warmed by how much you care about her, but then I remember that it took you meeting her to even entertain the idea of being with me.”

Kara bit her lip. “We don’t know that it’s her.”

“Please don’t lie to make me feel better,” Lena said, letting go of her hand.

“Sorry. I panicked,” Kara replied, rolling onto her back when Lena lifted up on her elbow to look down at her.

“I know I’ve been very intense…”

“I understand why.”

Lena let out a breath. “I don't like the way you look at her,” she confessed, “the way you touch her…” She took Kara’s hand and placed it on her waist and Kara gently squeezed, her stomach fluttering. “Your hands are supposed to be for me.”

“Only for you,” she breathlessly agreed.

Dark brows drawn together, Lena carefully moved over her and Kara steadied her with hands on her hips, their naked bodies warm as they came together. Releasing a soft breath, Kara enveloped Lena in a hug, her eyes falling shut when soft breasts squished against her own. And gently squeezed, when Lena lightly shook in her arms.

Lena had never lacked things and possessions, but she's never had people. Not for long. They were always ripped away from her, walked away, or hurt her so badly she had to let them go. And so, Lena had once explained, she had the urge to cling to Kara, like a child to her last toy, anticipating it would be snatched away at any moment, like all her others had been. She'd said it with shame and a fear that she would cling too hard and frighten Kara away.

In return, Kara had confessed how desperately she needed to be clung to. To be loved in that unequivocal way that Lena loved her in; with no fiancés and wives to make her feel like a second choice, or some dirty secret on the side. Kara needed to feel that sense of belonging Lena freely offered after everything she’d lost. After having feared rejection for all of her life, because she wasn’t human.

It was a thin line they stumbled along, Lena afraid to smother her, Kara afraid to be too needy and too different. Knowing it, changed little in stopping the insecurities from surfacing, but they’d been getting better with dealing with those particular emotions when they arose.

 _“Divil fah Rao gireh,”_ Kara rasped, and Lena’s eyes darkened in the red glow of their bedroom, her face hovering deliciously close as she searched Kara’s eyes.

“Are you sure?” Lena husked.

Kara nodded and Lena pressed a gentle kiss to the tip of her nose. “Words please.”

“ _Yes..._ I just need you closer,” she said and whimpered when Lena pressed a thigh between her legs.

“We’ll talk more tomorrow?”

Kara nodded. “Please show me…”

Strong fingers took hold of her chin, and then Lena’s lips covered her own. Hungrily. Possessively. Tongue firmly licking into Kara’s mouth, making her dizzy. And all Kara could do was moan from deep down in her belly; hips rocking to the slow cadence of Lena’s luscious kisses… Wet and warm as she senselessly slid against Lena’s thrusting thigh…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know reading Lena, Other Lena, Her-Lena, etc. is a bit distracting. Please bear with me while I find a way to properly transition into naming them, so they may read better.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> Dr. NotSoEvilPanda  
> Esquire.  
> <3


	5. Chapter 5

They didn’t have time to talk more the following morning, because they blissfully overslept, but Kara received strawberry jam kisses and waffles for breakfast, which were very nice and said a whole lot of comforting things.

Walking into Venture Tech hand-in-hand was nothing new, yet Kara heard the journalist staking out the building snap pictures of them. The story wasn’t just going to go away, not when not one, but two Luthors were involved. And Lex Luthor’s alleged body had disappeared into thin air, which at least fuelled the robot conspiracy theories.

It was an instinctive thing to take off her glasses when they got into the elevator, her spine straightening and her chin lifting as the nanotech fibres covered her body.

Lena placed a warm hand over the crest on Kara’s chest, her fingers soothingly tapping against the beat of Kara’s racing heart. “Whatever she says happened, that wasn’t you. She doesn’t know you, okay?”

Kara released a shaky breath and nodded. She knew that, but it was still Lena saying those things to her, making them hurt so much more. Squeezing the hand that slipped into her own, they continued the rest of the ride down in silence.

When the doors opened to the lab, they found Sam already there, seated on the floor, shoulder to shoulder against the forcefield with Lena. They were smiling, foreheads turned close, and even when her heart had dropped into her stomach at the sight of them, Kara couldn’t help but be relieved that the tension had lightened.

Well, that was until they were spotted and Other Lena rose to her feet, hands going behind her back, shoulders squaring and chin lifting. She had re-braided her hair the same way Kara had done it and Kara wondered whether it was a good idea to give her hairpins. She wouldn’t put it passed Lena to somehow use them to escape. Though she didn’t seem that agitated about being there, or being locked up for that matter when Lena had been interrogating her.

“I believe I owe you an apology.” Were the first surprising words out of her mouth.

“Me?” Lena confusedly wondered.

“ _Kara_.” She seemed to try out the name for the first time.

“Oh,” Kara said.

“Sam told me how you saved her and it was unfair of me to take my feelings about something that never happened here and you never did, out on you.”

Sam beamed and Other Lena flashed her a dimpled grin.

Kara scowled, grateful when Alex walked out of the apartment pulling her phone from her ear. When she motioned them over, Kara and Lena met her at the door.

“I spoke to Kelly,” Alex said, “she confirmed that the DNA sample was Lex’s but when she went to run further tests, all the swabs were empty.”

“Empty?” Kara frowned.

“The buds contained traces of dirt and tar, but no blood. Like it disappeared into thin air. I told Irons to check with his CSU techs and they came up empty too. Irons himself went to the scene and all that blood that was there yesterday, was gone. Not cleaned up, it was like it never existed.”

“Great, exactly what we need,” Lena mumbled, “more ominous mystery.”

Alex chuckled and gave her a one-armed hug guiding her back to the containment unit, only removing her arm when she stood in front of Other Lena.

“Ms Luthor,” Alex said, taking down the forcefield, though Lena didn’t move from the unit. “I’ve been officially deputised under the state laws of California and you’ve been remanded into my custody. You’ll be allowed to leave the containment unit and make use of the apartment adjacent to this lab only under my supervision.”

“Will you watch me shower too?” Other Lena asked, lifting a brow and Alex cleared her throat. “Privileges will be granted based on your continued cooperation and I’ve been authorised to secure you by any means necessary should you prove a threat to myself, or any other persons.”

“Why aren’t you dating _her_ , Lena?” she asked and Lena rolled her eyes as Kara’s heart painfully spasmed. “Instead you got yourself a puppy. You remember what Lillian said about pets—”

“You will remain in my custody until such time we find a way to send you back to your world—”

“Pets are only a placebo for people who have failed at securing the respect of their peers and subordinates.”

“ _Should you break any laws on Earth-Prime_ ,” Alex loudly continued, “these terms will be rescinded and you’ll be taken into custody to face trial and receive punishment in accordance to our laws.”

Other Lena licked her lips and blatantly gave Alex a once over. Kara was envious that Alex’s only response was a dark flush up her neck. Or maybe Kara was just easy when it came to Lenas, because she would’ve been a stuttering mess under the same scrutiny.

“Do you understand the terms as they’ve been set out to you, Ms Luthor?”

“I understand them perfectly, gorgeous.”

“Are you really gonna call her Ms Luthor?” Sam amusedly asked.

“Feels weird calling her Lena.”

“How do you feel about calling one or both of you by nicknames to make this easier?” Sam suggested, glancing between them and Kara was just relieved that they’d all decided to ignore the fact that Other Lena had killed them. It only seemed fair since she’d chosen to ignore that they’d killed Sam…Well, _they_ didn’t kill Sam, but Lena obviously didn’t kill _them_ either…Kara winced, grateful when Other Lena spoke to distract her from her whirling thoughts.

“Since I'm the interloper, I volunteer to be renamed,” she offered and yeah there she was. Kara grew soft, not nearly as visibly has Sam did though, who looked about ready to melt when Other Lena flashed her another disarming smile.

“How about Lee?” Kara suggested to stop them from looking at each other like that.

“ _No_ ,” both Lenas decisively said and Kara shrunk into herself.

“What about Lu?” Sam grinned, eyes twinkling when both Lenas snorted in unison.

“Lu?” Alex asked.

“They used to call Lena that at her all-girl private boarding school. Short for Luthor and initially meant as some teasing for her insistence on wearing boy's pants with her blazer—”

“Always enjoyed a good pant suit—”

“—but turned out she looked so hot she was practically drowning in pu—”

“ _Sam_!” they both exclaimed, but whereas Lena flushed, her doppelganger smirked in delight.

“So, I take it you like the name Lu?” Alex amusedly checked.

Other Lena shrugged. “Better than being confused with original me.”

“You went to boarding school with Lena?” Kara wondered.

“Sam saw a photo of me with the fencing club that some newspaper dug up for an article while I still lived in Metropolis,” Lena explained. “The name Lu was printed on the T-shirt I wore.”

“Can’t believe you’re fine with being named after a British toilet.” Kara chuckled, still smarting over the fact that it had been Sam’s suggestion they chose and that Sam even knew this fact about Lena to begin with.

“ _Lu_ ,” Other Lena said, abruptly intense, “ _not_ as in a British toilet, but as in the handful of friends I had understanding how the actions of my psychotic brother that year, influenced what my family name now meant. _Lu,_ _”_ she lowly growled, taking a step toward Kara _,_ “as in them choosing not to refer to me as _Luthor_ anymore like the teachers had come to sneer at me in disdain, or the press hounding the outside of my school screamed at me until I looked up so they could take pictures of my crying face. _Lu,_ ” she spat, “as in—”

“That’s enough,” Lena interrupted, moving her body between Kara and her other self. She was taller in her heels, but Other Lena’s stance was rigid, chin lifted in defiance to meet her glare.

“Whatever happened in your world,” Lena lowly seethed, “you don’t get to take it out on Kara who is the sole reason you’re not dead right now. And especially not after that little speech you gave to appease Sam.”

Their faces were identical in the way they glared each other down, everyone else awkwardly letting them, and Kara was ashamed at the way her stomach tightened at the two of them that close to each other.

Finally, Lu’s lips tilted into a smirk. “Happy to see you’re not as meek as you look.”

“I’m fortunate enough to carry my scars firmly on the inside.”

Lu’s smirk turned into a smile. “I’m happy for you.”

It was said with the utmost sincerity and Lena stiffly nodded.

“I apologise, Kara,” Lu said, dragging her gaze from Lena. “Adjusting to this world is proving difficult.”

“It’s okay,” she mechanically said, thrown by the entire altercation and her own emotions flip-flopping along with it.

“You need to eat, you’re making me look bad with those clothes hanging off of you like that. I do have an image to maintain.”

Lu grinned and followed Lena into the apartment. Kara glanced at Sam who was fondly staring after them and her stomach twisted uncomfortably.

***

The Lenas and Sam fluttered around the tiny kitchen preparing what they could scrape together from the food Lena kept there mostly for when Kara dropped by unexpectedly and it was too late to order in. Well, Lena and Sam were scraping together ingredients while Lu watched them with eyes glittering in awe, her guard seemingly finally down and looking so much younger all of sudden.

Alex was on the phone with Kelly, well first it had been Chief Irons, then she spoke to Brainy, and now it seemed she was simply softly updating Kelly and explaining that she might need to babysit Lu for the foreseeable future. Kara wanted to suggest taking Lu home with her and Lena, but knew that would be shut down before she even got all the words out. She was technically a prisoner and Alex was granting her a lot of leeway and it seemed to be working in getting her to relax and build some trust. All of them having a close relationship with a Lena Luthor went a long way in helping toward that.

While she spoke to her wife, Alex was also setting up a situation board.

Since Lex’s disappearance off the face of the planet, there’d been a string of thefts of very specific equipment from high security facilities around the world that were extremely unlikely for your average Joe to successfully pull off.

“We think it’s him,” Lena informed Lu and by extension Sam. “But after each burglary, the thieves have been found poisoned and dead, presumably after handing over their loot. So we have no clue as of yet who’s hiring them.”

Alex hoped that Lu could help with the investigation, because thus far, her appearance, the thefts and Lex’s disappearance had no obvious correlation and motive in common aside from very strong hunches from all of them.

“Framing me for his murder seems like the only reason I can think of him bringing you here and staging that scene on the rooftop,” Lena continued. “He didn’t take it very well when I walked away from him in this world he’d built and made himself king of.”

“Still can’t believe he changed so many things,” Lu said, and took a sip of wine. Alex had frowned at that but hadn’t verbally forbidden her from drinking, yet. Mainly because Lu had promised to only have a little sip when noticing the frowns directed at her. “And the bastard got away with it,” she said with disgust, “erased all the horrible things he’d done and was ultimately rewarded for it.” She took a big gulp of wine and promptly got the glass taken away from her by Sam who smirked at her half-hearted glare and went to finish up the pasta sauce, seemingly giving the Lenas the opportunity to catch each other up.

Kara ached to be near them, but instead, went to the bathroom to change out of her suit without attracting too much attention to herself. Lu seemed to be trying very hard not to see her as the Supergirl she’d known and despite the suit making Kara feel more confident, it might not be helping Lu’s view of her at all.

She took her time washing her face and attempted to sort through what she was feeling. And when she came out again, they were all seated around the small table. Alex had brought in a stool from the lab to sit on and Lena smiled at her, pulling out the chair between them.

Instantly breathing easier, Kara took her place behind the massive plate of pasta with what looked and smelled like marinara sauce poured over it.

Lu continued asking about Earth-Prime and freely answered questions about where she came from. It sounded as though Kara had never gone to work for her. But Darkseid wasn’t there either. So maybe she wasn’t the same Lena? It didn’t help that Lu had seemingly been unable to stop staring at her since she’d left the bathroom and Kara was grateful for Lena’s cool fingers gently stroking her heated neck, because she wasn’t sure how to react to the blatant attention.

“So the first thing that was stolen after he went missing were the plans to the Particle Accelerator at S.T.A.R. Labs?” Lu asked.

“Yes,” Alex said, “there may have been more break-ins, we’ve collated dozens over the past year to be safe, but the ones I wrote down in red on the board are the ones that ended in us discovering the dead bodies of the thieves via cyanide poisoning which suggests the burglaries were orchestrated by the same person.”

“How primitive,” Lu said with a grimace and reached for Sam’s wine glass, sighing when it was shifted away before she could get it. Kara smiled amusedly and Lu flashed a dimple at her, making her grow warm all over.

“I know, but situation boards help me sort through my thoughts,” Alex explained.

“No, the board is great, I was talking about the cyanide,” Lu clarified and Lena snorted. “What I don’t understand is why he’s going after the Particle Accelerator plans, and then stealing materials to manufacture at least twelve fusion reactors.”

“Given your appearance, I would say he was trying to get enough power going to open a portal,” Alex said.

“Which makes sense,” Lena agreed. “But what she’s confused by, is the mix of clean energy from the Particle Accelerator and nuclear energy from the reactors. Building a power source that strong and mixing the type of power supply used, will only lead to a higher likelihood of instability.”

“Maybe he’s deliberately trying to confuse you,” Sam suggested.

“Might not even be him,” Alex mumbled and everyone nodded, getting up and clearing the table.

Lu went to stare at the situation board and Lena joined her, both tilting their heads to the right, softly murmuring theories and Kara melted, grateful when Sam and Alex didn’t outright tease her about it, only softly snickering while they finished cleaning up.

“Wait, this is how big the Particle Accelerator is?” Lu asked, once Lena showed her copies of the stolen schematics on her tablet. “He can hardly hide building something like this…Maybe if he made it smaller…But even then, he has the ability to build his own clean energy generator. And must have enough funds to buy all these components legally.”

“Things bought legally can be traced,” Lena said.

“True, and these, why did he want _these plans_ specifically? It’s hardly the be all, end all, of clean energy generation. Is it something to do with the design?”

Kara gravitated toward them, entirely enraptured. “On one of the Earth’s, an earlier version of the Particle Accelerator exploded, creating a shockwave that covered Central City and created a few meta-humans.”

The Lenas turned when she walked up, making space for her between them.

“He wouldn’t still be trying to give himself powers?” Lena wondered.

Kara shook her head. “It was a freak accident. I doubt he would take the risk of building something on the odd chance it would break. Plus, these new plans are upgraded to hopefully prevent another accident like that.”

“Lex is as smart as he’s insane, I wouldn’t put anything past him,” Lu said. “He wouldn’t take the risk with his own life, maybe he has more copies of himself to sacrifice for his purposes.”

“After the shockwave, they used the Particle Accelerator to contain meta-humans,” Kara shared what Barry had told her. “He could be attempting to build a prison for me.”

Lena’s eyes lit up. “Kara, you’re a genius!” she said and Kara grinned but also felt slightly offended that Lena was that excited in the face of her possible capture and imprisonment.

“You had a way to block fifth-dimensional magic in your world,” Lena told Lu. “You found our father’s research?”

Lu nodded. “I seized everything Lex had after I killed him.”

Everyone winced at the casual manner in which she said it.

“Lionel knew about the Fifth Dimension?” Kara asked.

“He secretly discovered the Fifth Dimension after he was commissioned on a research project by Vandal Savage to study the cosmic forces of creation,” Alex informed, her and Sam having quietly stood to the side observing them. “We had copies of excerpts written by him in the D.E.O. archives stating his belief that Imps, like Mxy, appeared on Earth in the form of Leprechauns and Boggarts.”

“Lex would have access to all his theories,” Lena said.

“And that’s how he could build a portal to the Fifth Dimension,” Kara realised, “but that doesn’t explain why Brainy didn’t, and still hasn’t, picked up on Mxy’s magic. We’ve searched around the world.”

The Lenas looked at each other, Kara’s eyes shifting between them.

“Each cavity uses an 8.3 Tesla superconducting electromagnet on its barrier,” Lena told Lu.

“Not near enough for what he would need. But he could have—”

“No, that would be too dangerous,” Lena interrupted.

“Not even—”

“Doubling capacity would already be toeing a very thin line.”

Lu nodded. “He might’ve altered or even duplicated the prismatic refractor.”

Lena nodded. “But—”

“Not if he built the fusion reactors inside of it.”

“Yes, the Particle Accelerator itself would serve as a shield,” Lena said.

“And Mxy wouldn’t be able to use his magic inside!” Kara exclaimed.

“So he does have Mxy?” Alex asked.

“Possibly,” Kara said. “They think he could be using the Particle Accelerator as a prison, a modified prismatic refractor to power it so it can nullify his magic and contain him. And more than a couple of fusion reactors to power the portal to the Fifth Dimension built inside of the Particle Accelerator, too, preventing Brainy from picking up on anything.”

When she looked back from Alex, the Lenas were staring at her, one with a look of utmost pride and love, the other impressed, dark eyes smouldering with interest. Kara bloomed like a flower beneath their obvious appreciation.

“And he just walked into the Fifth Dimension and Mxy let himself be taken?” Alex sceptically asked.

“ _Not necessarily_ ,” the Lenas chorused and Kara’s face split into a grin.

Lu motioned for Lena to continue.

“I, unfortunately, feeling rather spiteful, had told Lex how I’d killed him in an alternate timeline as a way to…deter him from coming after me when I severed ties. He asked how, and I mentioned fifth-dimensional magic and insinuated it was me who went with the Imp, but the point is—”

“Fifth-dimensional magic leaves behind a distinct residue,” Lu interrupted, seemingly unable to help herself and Lena rolled her eyes but let her continue. “If he found any trace residue, he could’ve used it to…uhm summon?” she looked to Lena who nodded, “the Imp through the portal and to this dimension instead of going there himself.”

“Like sucking a genie back into its bottle,” Lena said and a collective round of aah’s came from Kara, Sam and Alex.

“So we change the search from fifth-dimensional magic and portals, to look for an energy output large enough to equal what? Three to four Particle Accelerators?” Alex asked.

“ _Exactly_ ,” the Lena’s chorused again and Kara doubted her heart would survive having two of them in her life. Just the one already had it near bursting capacity.

They grinned at each other and then at her and then Lu looked at Sam and something sharp stabbed at Kara’s heart.

***

The apartment was quiet, the news was on, but Kara barely registered what was being said as she stiffly sat on the edge of the bed, trying to not look at Lu who sat in the kitchen, unabashedly staring at her. Her posture was perfect, one leg crossed over her knee and her hands resting in her lap; physically demure, but vibrating with an almost predatory energy.

It had been the worst idea for her to volunteer to keep an eye on Lu while Alex and Lena went to talk to Brainy and Sam went back to work. She herself had work to do, her laptop was right there, which was why she’d been the obvious choice to stay, but she couldn’t move. Green eyes masterfully pinning her to the spot.

“I never noticed how beautiful you are.”

Kara’s breath left her in a whoosh, like someone had punched her in the gut, but in a good way. She adjusted her glasses and chuckled anxiously.

“Maybe it was the suit that made it difficult to see you properly.”

“It does have that effect.”

“Depersonalisation?”

Kara nodded. “Makes it easier to do my job.”

Lu hummed. “I like the glasses on you.”

Kara bit her lip. “Thank you,” she replied, having been aware that Lena did have an affinity for her eyewear.

“Are we really having sex?” Lu asked and Kara choked on her own spit.

“You’re my girlfriend.”

“I didn’t want to assume, maybe you two are saving yourselves for marriage…you do seem a little vanilla in public.”

Kara snorted a chuckle and rubbed the back of neck, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks.

“Ah, good for her…The things I bet she does to you…”

A squeak left Kara’s throat that she wasn’t sure how to describe. “I don’t—I don’t think this conversation is appropriate.”

Lu only laughed. “Do you treat her well?”

“I really hope so.”

“And Lena? How does she treat you?”

Kara smiled softly. “She’s the best.”

Lu hummed and then went back to staring at her.

“Do you—can I get you anything?” Kara awkwardly asked. “Is there anything that would make your stay here more comfortable?”

“You think you’ve met me before.”

“Maybe…Did your Jess’s mom get sick?”

Lena gave a stiff nod.

“Did she leave to take care of her?”

“She had to.”

“And…Are you…Are you sick too, Lena?”

Lu coldly stared back. “That’s none of your business.”

Kara bit her lip and nodded. Alex had conducted many tests and probably knew the answer, but Kara wouldn’t ask and Alex wouldn’t tell her. “We’ll be able to confirm where exactly you’re from once we get Mxy back.”

“And you just so happen to have had a fifth-dimensional Imp at your beck and call?”

“It’s a long story,” Kara said, not wanting to be accused again of being a selfish hypocrite. She was trying.

“And when you travelled back to that alternate timeline, you and I had sex?”

She was disturbingly blunt and Kara’s cheeks were permanently flaming in her presence. And she knew her reaction was the main reason Lu kept asking her such things, but she couldn’t help it.

“A little bit.”

Lu laughed. “A little bit? Was it good?”

“Yes,” Kara said. Despite getting flustered each and every time, she was a lot more comfortable dealing with naughty Lenas than she was a year ago. “It’s hardly a secret that I find you attractive.”

“Who would’ve thought…” Lu smirked. “A Super and a Luthor.”

“I’ve heard that nothing can compare to the might of a Kryptonian and a Luthor working together.”

Lu grinned, big and genuine. “You know, for a while, I thought Lex was very homo-erotically trying to kill your cousin.”

Kara barked out a surprised laugh.

“I never said anything out loud, very bad form to insinuate all evil people are gay, you know.”

Kara grinned. “True.”

“Bad enough that I added to that perception.”

“Do you think of yourself as evil?”

“When you kill so many people without feeling anything, how can you not be evil?”

“You felt nothing?”

“I was entirely numb to it. The whole process was very performative; like I was simply following a script.”

“I think that evil people at least feel some satisfaction when they do harm…” Kara carefully murmured.

Lu chuckled dryly. “I wish I had, at least there would’ve been some point to it. Sam was gone. My actions weren’t going to bring her back and I knew she wouldn’t have wanted me to go on a murder spree. But I did it anyway.”

“Why did you?”

“I had to do something. You— _they_ killed her. They didn’t even know her. If they’d known her before Reign…” Lu shook her head. “I guess you’re proof of that, aren’t you?”

“Proof of what?”

“The difference between those who deserve saving and those who are simply a threat to be eliminated, comes down to who the _hero_ is personally acquainted with.”

Kara stiffened. Would she have fought as hard to save Sam if she hadn’t known her? She’d been adamant not to kill because of her own moral values, not because of Sam, but she _had_ killed before. She’d killed aliens who had attacked her. If her other self had only seen Reign as an alien, without knowing Sam was in there… And what did it mean that Kara once held this view that no humans should die, but some aliens could under certain circumstances? The D.E.O. had conditioned her into normalising that alien equalled enemy. She’d hurt alien criminals in the past, the way she would never hurt human criminals. She’d been careful with humans. And though some aliens were strong, not all of them were.

Was she any different than Clark striving to be and feel as human as possible? Was it because she’d spent years hiding herself that subconsciously she’d begun to think of her alien side as lesser? Not anymore, though. Not since going back in time. Not since finding her mother again… Not since having Lena love her and embrace every part of her like it was normal to have red lights in your home and emergency sun lamps set up just in case… Lena went out of her way to protect Kara as though she was something precious and not one of the most powerful beings in the world.

“Look at the life you live,” Lu gently interrupted her reeling thoughts. “Look at who Lena Luthor has been allowed to be because she had you to believe in her and defend. Look at what a difference that makes,” she said and proudly lifted her chin even when her left hand lightly trembled and she clenched it into a fist. “Sometimes people tell you things about yourself so earnestly and consistently, that you eventually start to believe them.”

Kara sat very still, unsure what to say, certain any comfort she offered would be rebuked, her own mind still whirling with thoughts on her past actions. Lu just sent her a small smile which grew when Sam walked through the door along with Alex.

“I’m sorry, Lu,” Alex said, “but I’m going to need to lock you in for the evening. I’ll be in here if you need anything.”

Lu simply nodded and stood, but Sam looked ready to argue.

“I’ll be sleeping anyway,” she gently said and Sam deflated. “Will you come see me in the morning?”

Sam grinned and Kara’s heart sunk to the pit of her belly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun Fact: Those facts about Lionel Luthor are DC canon.   
> These Luthors have their fingers in everyone's pies...  
> ╮ (. ❛ ᴗ ❛.) ╭


	6. Chapter 6

Kara’s fingers flew over the keyboard of her laptop at super-speed, typing up an article discussing how renewable energy might not be all it was cracked up to be. The piece wasn’t submission ready, but she’d been neglecting work and needed to show something for those times she’d been M.I.A. over the last couple of days.

Around her, breakfast foods were placed down on the dining table and when a large glass of orange juice appeared in reach, she was glad to finish her proofread, shut the laptop lid and smile at Lena who sat down beside her.

“I’m so jealous you can do that,” Lena said with a grin. “All done?”

“First draft, at least. I need more sources though to make the opposing opinions more balanced.”

“Your articles always read brilliantly. I’m looking forward to your second Pulitzer win.”

“My first, in this world.”

“We know better,” Lena firmly said.

“Yeah.” She shyly smiled and picked up her fork.

“Maybe once things have settled, we could take a trip to Central City and see that Particle Accelerator in action. It might help with any follow up features if it happens passed your final deadline?”

“That would be great. Barry’s been asking that we come visit.”

“Maybe we could travel a little bit more too…”

“Yeah?”

“A holiday would be nice.”

Kara nodded. “Definitely. Anywhere you wanna go?”

“Just away. With you.”

She laughed. “Those are your only requirements?”

Lena hummed while she buttered her toast and Kara softly smiled, focusing on her food before she tackled Lena and neither of them left the apartment that morning.

“I would love that, Lena,” she said and dug into her meal. Though her forkful of pancake froze halfway to her mouth when she picked up on Lena’s frantic heart rate and slowly lowered the fork back to her plate to look at her. “You okay?”

Lena bit her lip in the anxious way, not the sexy way, and Kara frowned.

“Kara, I’ve known you for almost five years—”

Kara’s phone vibrated loudly and obnoxiously beside her plate and they both turned to look at it.

Lena let out an audible breath. “It’s work. You should take that,” she said, got up from her seat and disappeared down the hallway.

Kara confusedly stared after her, and then at the plate of toast and bowl of fruit she’d left behind, even as she answered the call and pressed the phone to her ear.

***

Despite that strange moment, it was a good morning all around. Lena came back and brushed off her concerns saying she needed to send a few emails and Kara had heard her tapping away on her laptop, so she left it. Things felt as though they were settling and she didn’t want to stir the pot. So of course she shouldn’t have been that surprised when she and Lena walked into the lab and found Lu pinning Sam against a wall, her tongue deep down Sam’s throat.

She shouldn’t have been surprised. But Kara was. Very much so. Enough to freeze and simply stare at them; at the way Lena touched Sam’s waist, intimately familiar with how that gesture felt both possessive and comforting. Her own side grew hot and tingled with longing, making her adjust her glasses on her face as her stomach swirled…

And she got it, she really did. How persuasive Lena could be. How unbelievably charming she was when she set those pretty green eyes on you and made you feel like you were her entire world. But that was no excuse. Lena wasn't—she wasn't—

“She's not for you,” Kara said, abruptly beside them, not sure when she’d walked up. “Why would you—why are you—this isn’t _right_ —”

Lena blinked confusedly and then her kiss-swollen lips parted and she moved away from Sam, and Kara stepped in front of her, facing Sam, heart furiously hammering and her body growing hot with ire. Sam couldn’t even look at her as she straightened her clothes and stared over Kara’s shoulder at Lena which only made Kara stomach boil and twist painfully.

“You need to leave. _Now_ ,” Kara seethed.

“Kara.” A hand gently curled around her wrist, above her clenching fist and she dragged her glare from Sam to look into Lena's pained eyes. And then she looked behind her at Lu— _not Lena_ —who was watching her carefully. And oh, _oh no_ _…_

“Come with me, please.”

It wasn't a request and Kara followed Lena to the apartment where a wide-eyed Alex had just exited from, gaze flicking rapidly between all of them. Looking back, Kara saw Lu place a comforting hand on Sam's shoulder and bristled again, but Lena closed the door, cutting off her view.

“Why is she always here!?” Kara shouted.

“Can you lower your voice please?”

“Sorry,” Kara said, straining at normal speaking volume, her insides agonizingly squeezing.

“She’s here because she’s the only one Lu actually knows…Why is that so difficult for you to accept?”

“Every time something big happens between us, _Sam_ _’s_ there.”

Lena frowned and tilted her head.

“Even in the other timeline when I told you I was Supergirl, you went to _her_ for reassurance when you were upset with me. You and I had the biggest fight of our lives and you went to _her_!”

“Because she was my only fr—”

“And now she’s all over Lu. Lu who doesn’t even know me. Who hates me and loves _her_. Who _killed_ me because I killed Sam. You don’t just have vengeance like that over a _friend_ , Lena.”

“I know you’re thinking that if Lu wants to pursue something with Sam, then I must want that too—”

“Don’t you?” Kara’s voice cracked, her chest aching.

“No, I’ve told you, I don’t. She’s not me, Kara…” Lena softly reminded and Kara just shook her head, eyes blurring with tears. “And from the sound of it, Sam was only ever her friend wherever she came from.”

“And now they’re suddenly kissing?!”

“Grief and relief make us do and feel many things.”

“Yeah? And what about Sam? She has sex with you and when another you shows up she’s all over her? Am I supposed to just be okay with her being your friend when she clearly wants to be with you?”

Lena’s eyes narrowed. “Yes.”

Kara's eyes widened, realising her mistake too late.

“You’re supposed to trust me and know that I wouldn’t allow her to do anything inappropriate and that I would end my friendship with her should she ever cross a line and disrespect you or our relationship.”

“Lena—”

“No, Kara. I’ve had to watch you act a fool over someone who isn’t me. I don’t care about similarities and that she’s me from another timeline. You made a commitment to _me_ , not her. And I’ve tried to be understanding about your confusion, but Lu and Sam are two consenting adults. And your behaviour just now was unacceptable and hurtful. You embarrassed me, yourself, and made a mockery of our relationship in the process.”

“That wasn’t—I didn’t mean…”

“I know that. Lu isn’t happening solely to you. Each time you remind me that she’s me, I have to deal with the knowledge that I killed you. That I killed Nia, Alex and Kelly. That circumstances drove me to do that. That I’m _capable_ of doing that. You being unable to differentiate us, _hurts_ , Kara.”

“I can differentiate you.”

“You can? Then why were you jealous of Lu kissing Sam just now?”

Kara’s lips parted, but only a soft breath left her as she looked at Lena’s teary face.

“What is it you want? For her to love you like I do? And then what? Do you want to be with her?”

“No! Lena, no! That’s not what I want,” Kara desperately and honestly said.

“That’s what your behaviour is showing me.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I messed up. I never meant—”

Lena shook her head and Kara snapped her mouth shut. “I can’t listen to you right now. I’m upset and will only make things worse.”

Nodding jerkily, Kara watched Lena leave the room and shakily sunk into a kitchen chair.

She wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but she blinked, eyes dry and burning, when Sam entered, closed the door behind her and took the seat opposite.

“Look, I know all of this is weird…” Sam said, her long fingers tracing invisible patterns on the tabletop. “I remember things from when Reign took over my body...”

Confused at the randomness of the statement, Kara looked to her face, but Sam was staring at her own hands.

“I have these nightmares sometimes. Extremely, unnecessarily vivid nightmares, detailing things that she did. I wake up feeling guilty, because they’re memories, but it’s me doing those things and I feel a sense of purpose that I was doing right. That I was fulfilling my destiny...There's a sort of peace in that single-minded determination. In having such a clear view of the world. Sometimes the dreams cause a great sense of fulfilment…”

She finally looked up and Kara swallowed thickly.

“I remember fighting you, holding your beaten body over the ledge of a building. Ready to kill you…” A tear rolled down Sam’s cheek and she quickly wiped it away. “I remember viewing you as an obstacle to remove and I remember you saving me when I thought all was lost. You gave me back my life. My daughter…”

“That’s a lot of conflicting things to feel.”

Sam chuckled dryly. “I know we’re not very close, Kara, and the reason for that, for me, is my guilt over those feelings, not because I’m secretly in love with your girlfriend.”

“Kind of hard to believe you given what I walked in on earlier.”

“I love Lena. I find her beautiful and attractive. But nothing more ever developed between us, because we always seemed to fit better as friends. Something we accepted long before she met you…”

Kara frowned. “Did…did Lu force—”

“No!” Sam immediately stopped that horrid thought and Kara let out a breath of relief and relaxed in her chair.

“Lu, she’s Lena, you know? But she’s also really not.”

Kara snorted out a chuckle. “Yeah.”

“Do you know what happens when you push aside your issues in order to be a good parent to a child who's already gone through so much?”

Kara shook her head, trying to keep up with the random jumps in the conversation.

“Not good things, Kara. You shove all your shit way down and you turn into a robot, prone to occasional mental breakdowns. Lu gets having those dark thoughts. She gets me and she got Reign. She looks at me like I’m a survivor, someone who's still fighting to survive. She doesn’t placate or pity. This morning, she laughed in my face when I lied to her about having a good night's sleep, because her showing up has dredged up _a lot_ of shit for me.”

Sam drily laughed, but then smiled fondly.

“She calls me out and sees right through me and instead of that scaring me, I’m finding it comforting. And I realise the reason she and I clicked like we did, was because of friendships we had with the Sam and Lena of our respective timelines and not actually with each other, and Kara,”—she reached out and tentatively covered Kara’s hand—“I in no way mean to discount the particular traumas you and Lena have lived through, but mine specifically, Lu understands. Getting to know her like this, I’ve found that she gets me now in a way that I pray Lena never ever will…”

Kara nodded and swallowed thickly.

“We kissed and I don’t even know how it happened…She’s very persuasive.”

“Yeah, she can be.”

“I don’t regret it,” Sam softly admitted. “And I don’t know if I’ll end up only being friends with her too, but I’m sorry if what I did hurt you. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Neither was I,” Kara murmured. “I don’t know how to not project the love I feel for Lena onto her too.”

“I’ll try to keep my lips off of her—”

“You don’t have to—”

“No really, there’s enough happening right now without adding to it. I would like to continue spending time with her and I don’t want you and Lena feeling awkward about that.”

Sam was so perfect. It was why it was so difficult to understand why Lena wasn’t with her.

“Of course. And I’m sorry for my behaviour. I reacted very badly.”

“Not that I can even imagine being in a similar situation, but I can understand your reaction. She’s just so horny, Kara, and she didn’t seem to have done much, it feels like I was the one who jumped her? She really goes for it, you know? Lena has never been like that with me…I wasn’t prepared…”

Kara chuckled to herself, because she was very familiar with that side of Lena. It felt overwhelmingly good to be seduced by her.

“Did Lena ever tell you the details of when I travelled to the alternate timeline? How I ended up in who seems to have been Lu’s apartment?”

Sam’s eyes lit up with curiosity, but there was a sharp knock on the door, followed by Alex’s head poking through.

“Brainy’s got a lead on our power source.”

***

According to Venture Tech’s satellites, Lex had built his Particle Accelerator underground in the Atacama Desert. When he’d had the time to build it, Kara didn’t know, but Lex had been a very powerful man before his disappearance and who knew how long the massive bunker had been out there before he started to remodel.

Hovering side-by-side above the sand dunes and rocky hills, Kara awkwardly cleared her throat.

“I know you’re upset with me right now, but is it okay if I said something about what we’re arguing about?”

“Yes,” Lena said, armour clinking as she crossed her arms, her helm covered head making it impossible for Kara to tell what she was really feeling.

“I know I was wrong earlier. For shouting and acting possessively over Lu…I feel really ashamed about my behaviour and hate that my insecurities have hurt you.”

Lena quietly hovered for a long moment and Kara cursed herself for waiting until then to talk to her when they were all suited up. But Alex and Brainy had been prepping them before their flight and they’d just gone off comms, and she didn’t want to continue on the mission without clearing up at least a few things.

Lena’s helm receded to reveal sad green eyes that made Kara ache and ache and ache.

“I’m not confused about who I want to be with, Kara. I’m trying to understand, but there’s no choice I need to make between you and Sam. She and I decided that we were best as friends long before you and I entered a relationship. You are the only one confused right now.”

“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I’ll try to stop equating Lu’s level of affection for Sam with yours. Sam came to speak to me earlier and what she said about the differences between you and Lu, really made me look at things differently. I think I might even have seen it for myself had Lu and I spent more time together… And also if I wasn’t wallowing in insecurity each time I’ve been in her company...”

“Do you love me?” Lena thickly asked.

“Of course, I do,” Kara instantly answered.

“Do you believe that I love you?”

“Yes, Lena.”

“Are you happy with me?”

“More than I’ve ever been.”

“And I’m happy with you, too. I never thought it was possible for me to have what we do...”

Kara smiled, but it fell away when Lena earnestly search her face.

“Can’t you let that be enough?” she tremulously asked.

“It’s more than enough.”

“I feel as though I haven’t made you feel secure in our relationship…I don’t know what more I can do…”

“C-can come closer?” Kara rasped, releasing a breath when Lena gave a jerky nod.

She hovered nearer, smiling tentatively when Lena’s gauntlet covered fingers rested on her hips.

“Please don’t be sad because I acted like an idiot,” Kara said and smiled a little wider when Lena lightly shook her head in exasperation. “You know it’s all your fault for making me love you so much that I want all the Lenas in the universe to be mine.”

Lena bit her lip and Kara hovered closer, pressing up against the hot metal of Lena’s suit, gently resting her hands on her shoulders to not strain her propellers.

“You love me so well, Lena…Having Lu hate me, well not me, but the other me, it was jarring, you know?”

Lena nodded and Kara brushed their noses together, giving hers a little nudge and making Lena smile like she knew it would.

“You are more than enough,” Kara whispered, hovering her face close and her shoulders loosened when Lena pressed a kiss on her lips. “And I will work on showing you that more often to make up for being an idiot, but right now, we need to get you out of the sun,” she murmured, kissing Lena’s red cheeks, because when Lena got sunburned it actually made her ill and they hadn’t brought any sunblock.

“You’ve been showing me, Kara. You don’t need to do more, or anything special.”

Kara nodded. “I just need to stop acting a fool over other women.”

Lena lightly laughed and Kara flashed her a grin. Wanting to emphasise again how much she loved her, but she didn’t want to seem disingenuous despite the way her heart grew at Lena’s smile.

“Okay,” Lena accepted and Kara blew out a breath. “Ready to go? Alex is going to expect a check-in in thirty minutes.”

Kara bit her lip, thinking about kissing her again, but wasn’t sure, and whimpered when Lena’s soft lips covered her own a moment later.

“Focus, Kara,” she said, smirking as her helm covered her head.

“Will be a lot easier now without the distraction of your beautiful face.”

Lena chuckled. “Far too cheesy, darling,” she said and flew onward, Kara and her heart, soaring beside her.

They were simply doing reconnaissance before deciding on an approach and when they reached the coordinates from where the power source was emanating, Kara attempted to scan the hollow space below the sand for weapons and enemies.

“It’s lead-lined,” she said, after she couldn’t get passed the first layer of material. “Or it’s the Particle Accelerator blocking me.”

Lena tilted her head and was quiet for a few seconds. “One human-sized body radiating a temperature of 110 degrees Fahrenheit in the centre of the structure.”

“You think it’s Mxy?”

“I don’t know, but it’s the only living thing in there, despite the unnaturally high body temp.”

“Certain?”

“Positive.”

“The centre?”

“Kara?”

Kara pulled back slightly and then torpedoed down toward the structure at super-speed, grinning when she heard Lena’s long-suffering sigh as she flew after her. She broke through the top layer of sand, various metals beneath it, into the bunker and stopped short from going right through the floor. As she predicted, the hole she made in the roof, broke the forcefield put out by the Particle Accelerator and didn’t impact her powers, which was good, since she was immediately shot at by multiple turrets firing kryptonite laser beams, obviously programmed to recognise her.

She dodged them until Lena entered, easily shooting down the turrets with her auto-aim targeting system.

Kara sent her a sheepish grin, grateful Lena’s helmet hid her face away, and busied herself scanning their surroundings. It looked and felt like an engine room. Hot and humid, the walls lined with a gunmetal tiled design, and various reactors in a neat row up against them.

After finding no other obvious offensive security protocols, they settled on staring up at the elongated cell in the centre with its glass door. The same gunmetal square tiles lined the cell’s inner walls and inside of it, Mxyzptlk stood, staring at them with wide, disbelieving, eyes.

“Kara?” He seemed afraid to hope.

Kara moved forward, but stopped at Lena’s gauntlet covered hand on her shoulder.

“How did you get in there?” Lena asked.

Mxy let out a breathless laugh. “Lovely to see you too, Ms Luthor. Your brother, and I’m ashamed to admit this, tricked me.”

“How?”

“I’ve been told that I might be a little gullible at times,” he self-deprecatingly said. “I was drawn here, where I found another prisoner. Or so he presented himself as. He managed to gain my trust and once he learnt what he wanted, revealed himself as my captor. He convinced me that he was a danger to my world and all I needed to do for him was one thing. I believed him because I wanted to. Being powerless and confined is not a feeling I enjoy.”

“What did you need to do for him?” Kara asked though she had a pretty good idea.

“All he wanted was two look-alikes. Nobody would get hurt, he’d said. That was all I needed to do.”

“Lu and the Lex from the rooftop,” Lena muttered. “Why didn’t we pick up on the magic being used?”

“Why would you?”

“I set up precautions to pick up on fifth-dimensional magic in use.”

“Oh, well. We didn’t need to travel through timelines for what he wanted and said that the shield would be off for three seconds, enough for me to blink away from here certainly, but he made sure I understood that he could summon me back immediately and with dire consequences.”

“A three-second surge wouldn’t be enough for us to have picked up on,” Lena admitted.

Kara nodded and looked around. “Would you mind?”

Lena walked over to the control panel and it wasn’t long before the reactors and Particle Accelerator were powered down.

“I need to safely destroy as much of this as I can before Alex contacts the military,” Kara said while she let Mxy out of his cell.

Lena nodded and walked back to them. “Make use of the safehouses, I’ll take care of the reactors later. Mxy and I will wait for you nearby in case Lex comes back.”

Mxy, who’d been going through a range of elaborate yoga stretches after leaving his cell, grinned and flung himself into Lena’s arms, who caught him with a soft grunt and a gentle hiss of hydraulics, holding him bridle-style as he wrapped his arms around her neck and batted his eyelashes at her helmed face.

“You could’ve just snapped your fingers. Isn’t that what you do?” Lena deadpanned.

He laughed in delight, lifted his hand, and with a snap of his fingers they both disappeared, leaving a grinning Kara behind.

***

Alex had taken a step back from the frontline action, as had Kelly. Kara knew it was because they were trying to have a baby and Alex staying out of the line of fire and not blowing things up was part of the compromise that went into that. It seemed though, the second Alex had reluctantly withdrawn from the field, Lena had stepped up in her place and she wouldn’t put it past them, if they’d planned it that way. They were as protective of Nia as they were of her and it should be an insult that even when they were the ones with actual superpowers, it was their humans trying to protect them.

Having Lena at her back, though, always served as extra peace of mind. It had Kara confidently charging into buildings knowing Lena’s suit seemed to be designed to counteract any of her weaknesses. But despite Lena having proven time and again that she could take care of herself, Kara still worried. So she quickly went to store the nuclear components and went back to demolish most of the Particle Accelerator, trusting that Lena would have copied and wiped clean any data evidence.

Once done, she found them atop a sand dune about a mile away. Lena’s helm was off and Mxy had a large sun hat on his head, despite both of them lounging in the shadow of a massive rainbow-coloured beach umbrella, a cocktail each in their hands. She almost felt bad to interrupt them and take Lena back to the lab where she would be reminded that Kara had thrown a jealous fit over a woman she wasn’t in a relationship with.

“So Darkseid could still be a threat?” Lena asked, apparently both catching Mxy up on what was happening and interrogating him about Lu, like Kara knew she would.

“He could be. The alternate timelines created themselves, we simply asked the question and it adjusted to the hypothesis. The one with the version of yourself you now refer to as Lu, we simply asked what would happen had you and Kara never become friends. The world adjusted to ensure that you never would.”

“So it created conflict to keep us apart?” Lena asked. “Like me crashing with that helicopter, disappearing from National City, labelling Supergirl a vigilante, and adding a villain trying to recruit me to steal Myriad from Supergirl to continue driving that rift between us?”

“Exactly. It’s really refreshing talking to you, Lena,” he said and took a sip of his drink.

“And you’re certain that Lu is the same Lena that I met?”

Lena looked at her, but Kara’s gaze remained fixed on Mxy. She just needed to know for sure.

“She is.”

“And you removed me from her memory?”

“Lex Luthor requested a very specific set of parameters for his sister. She checked most of his boxes and I only had to add a few more of his specifications.”

“These are people, Mxy, not devices,” Kara incredulously said.

“They’re constructs grabbed from a simulated world…”

“Well, she feels your _specifications_ as though they’re real! In her mind, she lived through them all!”

“I needed to choose her specifically.”

Kara deflated as her confusion grew. “What?”

“He wanted me to build a monster, Kara. A threat to you. I did what I could by adding the scar and the hair to not be noticeable to Lex for easier differentiation…And I could only trust that Lena wouldn’t hurt you. She hadn’t in any of the timelines she knew you in. I could only hope you would win her over this time too.” He smiled anxiously. “And you did!”

“What were the specifications for the Lex you brought here?” Lena interjected and Kara took the offer of reprieve for what it was and tried to understand what she was feeling as she glared at the sand.

“That he be easy to manipulate and obey his every command.”

“Simple enough, since he was only meant to be a sacrifice to frame me for murder,” Lena muttered.

She got up, handed her cocktail glass to Mxy, and after a nod from Kara that she was okay, they appeared in the lab where Sam and Lu were talking to each other, standing a good six feet apart.

Kara bit her lip and hung her head in shame.

Alex was probably up with Brainy and Kara wanted to ask Lena if she’d called to check-in, but the air grew tensed and Mxy worriedly glanced between them all.

“Well,” Lu said and clapped her hands together causing everyone to start. “Guess it’s time for me to go home. It’s been nice meeting you all.”

“What? No,” Kara said, looking between them. Home? There was no home for her to go to. “Why can’t you stay?” she asked and turned to Mxy. “She can stay here, right? Her world doesn’t exist, her being here won’t change anything.”

Lena rubbed her forehead and Mxy cleared his throat and Kara’s stomach knotted.

“I wish I could, Kara.”

“But you can. She’s right there. Just leave her there.”

“Every sentient being in all worlds and dimensions, take up...space. Lu is Lena. She's not a facsimile and not from a different dimension. The universe recognises them as the exact same person and therefor they can’t exist at the same time.”

“What happens if they do?” Sam asked.

“There will be an attempt to assimilate.”

“Become one person? A new personality?” Sam asked.

“Perhaps.”

“ _Perhaps_?” Kara’s voice rose, wanting him to deny what she already knew he would say.

“The process will be so traumatic that once melded, the chances are great that they won’t mentally survive the merger.”

“No,” Kara whispered, and moved in front of Lena, shielding her from the rest of the room. She hadn’t realised what she’d done until Lena gently placed a warm hand on her lower back and her forehead pressed between Kara’s shoulder blades.

Across from them, Lu met her gaze and smiled, eyes soft and understanding and Kara was abruptly taken back to that moment in the Fortress of Solitude where Lu had told her to go home to Lena. Perfectly content with her fate if it meant happiness for herself in reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *crickets*  
> *awkward cough*  
> *runs*


	7. Chapter 7

“How much time do we have?” Lena asked, moving from behind Kara, but taking her hand and entwining their fingers. “If I have enough time, I could maybe come up with a solution for her to stay here safely.”

“I can’t say,” Mxy said. “We hardly experimented with this. It can take anything from a few weeks to a couple of months…I’m really sorry, I never anticipated—I _should_ _’ve_ , given Kara’s quick affections before, but I thought it would be okay since you had Lena here—”

“You just sent her off and washed your hands of her!” Kara shouted and bit the inside of her cheek when Lena squeezed her hand. “You knew this could happen—that Lena could—that bringing Lu here would hurt them both and you did it anyway?”

“I’m sorry, Kara,” Mxy said looking so despondent she wanted to tell him that it was okay, but it _wasn_ _’t_. None of this was okay. “I thought I was doing the right thing by prioritising the safety of others and bringing Lu here and not creating a mindless killing machine…”

“At both their expense! You didn’t even know how long it would take. What if we didn’t find you in time? They would’ve—Lena would’ve—”

“You did what you had to,” Lu said and Mxy sent her a pained smile and Kara felt ready to explode.

“Yes,” Lena rasped and Kara glared at the side of her face. “We know the destruction I’m capable of when angered and hurt.”

“Lena—” Kara started, but Lu cut her off.

“Now that we’ve established that no one’s at fault for the things Lex is responsible for, and the Imp did everything he could to prevent loss of life, let’s get this over with,” she said and Sam moved even further away from her. “Beam me up, or away, or whatever it is you do.”

Everyone simply stared at her.

“Come on, you’ve got the better version of me, you’ll survive.”

Sam walked into the apartment and closed the door, probably because they were blocking her escape route to the elevator.

Lu’s jaw clenched and her smile left her face. “Can you please stop prolonging this?” she angrily hissed. “You’re making it harder than it needs to be.”

Lena helplessly looked at Kara, gripping her hand so tightly it hurt and Kara bit her lip, nodding in understanding.

“Would you stay for the night at least?” she asked. “We could have a nice dinner and you can say goodbye to Sam without being an asshole about it.”

Lu had the decency to look ashamed.

“And in the morning,”—Kara looked to Mxy—“you could send her back?” Her voice cracked over the word ‘back’. “They’ll be safe for a few hours, right?”

He nodded and smiled sadly. “Of course. I’ll be a call away to ensure it.”

“What if Lex summons him again?” Lu asked.

“I’ve taken precautions,” Mxy said, proudly lifting his chin. “I am monitoring him as we speak. You have time.”

“Fine,” she muttered, then walked toward the apartment and softly knocked on the door. She waited for a long time; hands twisting behind her back.

“Sammy,” she softly called. “Please let me in?”

Kara’s heart ached and she wanted to snatch her back and keep her to herself, even as she was relieved when Sam finally opened the door.

***

Despite Mxy monitoring Lex, Brainy was watching the underground bunker in case Lex went back and realised he’d lost a valuable asset. He seemed to have kept Mxy prisoner should he need him in future and was most likely laying low, waiting for either Lu to kill them all, or for authorities to arrest Lena for his murder.

With Lex finally in reach, it seemed a frivolous thing to be having a dinner in the midst of everything, but Kara and Lena went shopping and set about preparing a meal for the four of them like some warped double date, upon Lu’s insistence they be there.

Lu hardly knew anyone else and Kara was only grateful to have been included by name in the invitation to stay.

Seated around the kitchen table, Lu picked up her wineglass and gulped down the contents. No one stopped her when she licked her lips and poured herself a refill.

“I know I technically don’t exist at all, but it’s been a balm to the soul to see you happy,” she told Lena. “And to see Sam alive.”

Sam smiled and looked at Lu as though she would disappear at any second.

“I wish I could’ve seen Ruby happy too, but yes, she doesn’t need all these questions as to who I even am, and she does have these two in her life anyway.” She motioned to Kara and Lena. “And since these are my final hours—”

Lena groaned. “Please stop being so dramatic.”

“Since these are my _final_ hours on any Earth,” Lu gravely announced, eyes twinkling with mischief, “hold me Sammy,” she whispered, leaning closer when Sam flung an arm around her, trying not to laugh, “I think it’s only fair, I share with you some anecdotes from Lena’s youth.”

“ _No_ ,” Lena warned while Kara sat up with interest.

“This needs to happen, Lena. The puppy needs to know what a gay mess you are.”

“She’s very much aware of that already,” Lena replied with an eye roll as she picked up her wine glass. “Unfortunately.”

Kara beamed at them.

“In what comes as a shock to absolutely no one, Lena used to have a crush on her science teacher.”

“Lena? Don’t you mean we? _We_ had a crush. Or better yet, use _I_.”

“Don’t try to drag me into this, I technically don’t have a past and would never have been that sad.”

“Rude.”

“She was sixty years old!” Lu guffawed, and so did Sam. Kara bit her lip, turning to a flushed Lena.

“She was fifty-five,” Lena mumbled, “and very smart and took great care of herself. She was a beautiful woman who treated me like the twelve-year-old child I was.”

“And graciously accepted the very inappropriate poem you wrote for her.”

“Poem?” Kara grinned, placing her arm around the back of Lena’s chair, and nuzzled her nose into Lena’s hair when she shyly hid her face into Kara’s shoulder.

“I don’t remember it,” Lena muttered against her shirt.

“ _Your eyes keep me trapped like the nucleus of an atom_ ,” Lu recited and jumped up even before Lena did.

“Lu, I will kill you very slowly and painfully,” Lena warned and Lu beamed, dimples deep and cheeks flushed pink.

“ _Trapped in your orbit, your smiles make me do quantum leaps_!” she shouted and jumped away when Lena tried to catch her.

“ _For I am but a lonely electron_ — _mmph_.” Her words were cut off when Lena’s hand covered her mouth and they both burst out laughing.

***

“You don’t like dancing?” Kara confusedly asked, reclined on the kitchen chair, squished tightly to Lena’s side their heads closely together while they watched a drunk Lu guiding Sam through a slow dance even when she’d just loudly complained that she didn’t like dancing.

“I don’t,” Lena confirmed, taking Kara’s hand and playing with her fingers. “I do it because it makes you happy and that trumps any awkwardness or self-consciousness I might feel at the time.”

Kara guessed that part of her must’ve known that, because when they did go out, she never forced Lena to dance with her, who always made a point of joining her at least once per outing. “But slow-dancing is okay?”

Lena hummed. “It’s a little like vertical grinding, isn’t it?”

Kara snickered and watched Lu spin Sam around, before dipping her low and pressing a quick peck on her cheek.

Her heart clenched and she slowly looked at Lena staring intently at their entwined fingers.

“Would you like some time alone with her?” Lena thickly rasped. “Sam and I could—”

“No.”

Lena looked up, gaze uncertain.

“I’m sorry if I ever made you feel that it was a matter of choice for me. My feelings for her has always been based on my feelings for you.”

Whatever Kara felt for Lu, Lu had only known her personally for a couple of days. It would be selfish to insist on time with her only to assuage Kara’s own feelings… She’d done all she was asked to, so that Lu could spend her night the way she wanted and getting drunk with her best friend seemed to be her only wish.

Lena looked at Kara for a long moment, before her gaze softened, and then twinkled devilishly. “You’re just saying that because she chose Sam over you.”

Kara gasped, placing a hand over her heart. “That was vicious, Lena.”

Lena sniffed. “Think I’ll ask Mxy to bring me another Kara,” she announced and got up, gathering her bag.

Kara pouted. “My mama warned me about boys like you.”

“You should’ve listened to her,” Lena haughtily replied, despite gently taking Kara’s hand and brushing a thumb over her knuckles. “We’ll see you in the morning,” she said to the other two wrapped up in each other.

“Thank you for dinner!” Lu shouted.

“Good night!” Sam said and was spun around again until she succumbed to a fit of drunken giggles.

With a smile and a wave, Kara closed the door behind them and followed Lena’s swaying hips to the elevator.

It was a trap. Kara knew it.

“You know, Lena,” she said and pressed her up against the wall next to the elevator doors. “Technically, I’m like 54 years old…”

“I know.”

“And I do enjoy poems very much...”

“I know that too.”

“So if you ever feel inspired…”

“Yes…?”

“And if you ever have any granny fanta— _mmph_ ,” Lena’s hand covered her mouth, eyes twinkling with mirth.

“If you ever want to have sex with me again, Kara Zor-El, you will _never_ say the words granny fantasies in my presence. Are we clear?”

Kara nodded and licked Lena’s palm, causing her to laugh and shake her head fondly.

“Sometimes I love you so much it makes me sick,” Lena said, and kissed her so deeply, Kara’s head swam and she groaned when Lena’s fingers threaded into her hair.

“That hardly sounds healthy, Lena…” she mumbled, catching her breath and kissed Lena’s jaw.

“I’m very much aware.”

Kara nipped at the soft skin of Lena’s neck, grazing her teeth across a pulsing throat. “I’m sorry that I’m so great it makes you sick.”

“You should be,” Lena lowly growled and pulled Kara into another hungry kiss, but they both jumped in surprise when the elevator doors dinged opened and Alex stepped out.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said, taking in their dishevelled states. “Are the red lights like an aphrodisiac for you two? Can you not keep it in your pants whenever you’re near them?”

“Lena made me do it,” Kara said and Lena scoffed.

Alex pulled a face. “Yeah, I wish I didn’t know what a blatant lie that was.”

Lena laughed and kissed Kara’s shoulder, to stop her pouting.

“There’s an issue with Lex.”

And just like that, the mood was gone.

***

They flew side-by-side to their destination, after Kara and Lena had a brief and intense argument about Lena going with her. She’d tried to argue that Lena had been drinking and therefor shouldn’t be operating advanced-tech death suits, but Lena’d only had one glass, as though she’d anticipated something happening that night. Well, she’d probably anticipated them spending their night beneath the red lights in their bedroom so they didn’t need to think about saying goodbye to Lu, and Kara would much rather have been doing that despite her need to get Lex out of their lives for good.

The plan had been for Supergirl to go in with the military at her back the next day. Mainly so that they would have official witnesses to Lex’s insanity and criminality. But it was late at night, Dreamer and Brainy were driving to their location to provide back-up and would be a few minutes behind, along with the special task force sent to aid them. Lex would probably say he had nothing to do with the Particle Accelerator, or what happened on that rooftop, but maybe Lena’s suit could record him incriminating himself.

After doing a flyby assessment of the area, they landed outside a warehouse in National City’s downtown industrial area, next to a red shipping container as per instructions. Lillian Luthor walked out of it and sized them up.

When the tip-off had come in, everyone was understandably skeptical of the source. Mxy though, had confirmed that trap or not, Lillian and Lex were where she said they would be. Whatever Lillian’s endgame was, they didn’t want to lose the element of surprise and ignoring her might’ve meant Lex going underground again. He had the technology to prevent even Mxy’s omnipotent magic from finding him.

Lena receded the helm of her suit and Kara kept an eye out, resisting the urge to take Lena in her arms and fly her as far away from Lillian as they could get.

“Why are you doing this, Mother?”

“I'm tired of this insanity and obsession,” Lillian said, swallowing thickly.

“How do we know this isn't a trap?”

“You don't. He's in there. Do with that information what you will.”

“Does he know we're here?”

“By now? Most likely.”

Lena nodded.

“I’m just thankful Lionel isn’t alive to see what his children have become.” Lillian sneered and Kara glared at her. “You turning your back on your family to cavort with the likes of her, and Lex…Lex has—”

“Turned into a stark, raving, lunatic?”

“And whose fault is that?”

Lena laughed incredulously. “You aren’t seriously blaming me for Lex’s psychopathy?”

“He told me everything he did to save the world and to keep us together as a family and you threw that back in his face.”

“He didn’t restore your memory, did he?”

Lillian frowned.

“You don’t remember half the things he’s done. Any of the things you’ve done…” Kara realised why Lex was such a surprise to this Lillian. She’d never gone to prison and was probably never leader of Cadmus since there were no reports of the organisation ever existing. She might genuinely think that up until a year ago, Lex was as good a person as he had orchestrated to be perceived as on Earth-Prime.

“Does it matter?” Lillian angrily huffed. “He tried his best and you betrayed him. You betrayed us, Lena.”

“Then why did you call us here?” Lena asked.

“People might say I’m a bad mother for even doing this, but I can’t let him—and I can't hurt him.”

“No, you reserved that honour solely for me.”

“We both know that you were never really mine, were you?” Lillian sadly stated, turned, and walked away.

“Lena—”

“The Wayne exoskeleton is a warmachine,” Lena softly said and Kara placed both hands on her metallic shoulders, trying to meet her eyes.

“Lena—”

“Easy to move in, with a power distribution to maximise damage, at the expense of shields.”

“Do you need a minute? We have a minute. We have many minutes. We don’t even need to do this tonight.”

Lena shook her head and closed her eyes when Kara placed a kiss between her brows.

“So he'll go for as much damage as fast as possible?” Kara asked.

Lena bit her lip. “Yes. I'll draw his fire and destroy his barriers, which will leave him open for you even when you’re at lower strength in the anti-kryptonite suit.”

“I don’t like that plan.”

Lena sighed, unsurprised.

“ _I_ _’ll_ take down his barriers, while you take down his other defences,” Kara said. “When I destroy his suit, you take him down.”

“Okay,” Lena conceded and gave her a quick kiss on the lips. “I’ll have your back.”

“I know,” Kara said, touching the face of her wristwatch, her anti-kryptonite suit covering her body, as Lena’s helm covered her head.

***

“So, you finally stopped salivating over each other long enough to face me,” Lex said, stood in the centre of the mainly empty warehouse. His new suit was moulded to his body, a camo pattern that shone with a kryptonite glow. The helm was off though, so they were treated to the look of pure disgust on his face.

Multiple turrets were set up again, all of them having targeted Kara the instant she entered.

“I wouldn’t expect you to know what the love of a good woman feels like,” Lena drawled and Kara wished Lex could’ve seen her face so the insult would’ve hit harder.

“Who needs love when you have power. You’ve always let that make you weak, Lena.”

“She has power,” Kara said. “Power she earned, unlike you who had to wish for it.”

“Her power comes from having _my_ name. From walking in _my_ shadow and picking up _my_ scraps.”

Kara snorted. “The best part of this, is you know that’s not true. It’s why you tried to frame her for your murder to discredit her. Imported another version of her to kill me, and still she proved you wrong. You can’t understand her, or predict her behaviour, because she’s nothing like you, despite your best efforts.”

“Enough of this,” Lex said.

“What? No villain monologue?” Kara retorted, preening when Lena snorted out a chuckle.

“I think I’ve given you more than enough chances to stay in this family, Lena. You chose to betray me, each time.”

“Like your mother just betrayed you?” Lena sniped.

Lex sneered. “She’s not my mother.”

“Because she doesn’t blindly go along with your plans?”

“Because she doesn’t remember me! She’s not the woman she once was. She actually thinks running the Luthor Foundation is an accomplishment. She can’t see past this delusion that—”

“ _You_ created?” Lena laughed.

“I should never have restored your memory,” Lex seethed. “You never deserved the Luthor name. Our family would’ve been better off if my father had left you in that orphanage. You’ve been nothing but a colossal disappointment. A failure and an insult—”

Kara crashed into him, dragging him along and slammed him into the ground, his bald head hitting cement a second after his helm came up to protect it. Before she could do more damage, the turrets fired, and she had to dodge them and Lex blasting kryptonite beams at her. Thankfully, Lena had recovered from the emotional assault and was shooting down the turrets and Kara could focus on her task of destroying Lex’s shields.

She wasn’t as fast in her suit, and though he was still slower than her, his armour had multiple muzzles firing at her from all around his body. It wasn’t long before the kryptonite radiating from him began to seep through the minor damage in her suit, that was the nature of the poison. Lena knew it would happen, which was why she’d tried to go first. But Kara needed to make sure his barriers were down before Lena engaged, and with one final punch, she blew out his shields bracing herself when he knocked her back and sent her skidding across the floor.

Lena was on him before he could even think of pursuing and Kara took a moment to catch her breath, removing her helm. She wasn’t very worried about Lena’s safety, as her suit was now far better than his. The only reason the same technology couldn’t be applied to Kara’s, was because it interfered with the effectiveness of her powers. Her body’s similarities to kryptonite was a cosmic joke.

Sitting up on the hard cement, she watched the intent way Lena attacked her brother. There was an intense desperation to her movements as she blew Lex’s suit apart, piece by piece. He had so much kryptonite on him, it still made Kara’s head spin from clear across the warehouse.

Lena was going to kill him. Kara knew it as certain as she knew the sun would rise in a couple of hours.

Lex’s maniacal laughter echoed through the air and a chill went up Kara’s spine as it seemed to only fuel Lena’s ire. He wanted her to kill him. In some sick way, he probably thought that it would mean that he’d won.

“Mxyzptlk!” Kara called and was grateful when he appeared sitting beside her. He technically had no reason to answer to her, but his concerned gaze flicked between Kara seated on the dirty ground and Lena demolishing her brother.

“Lex kidnapped you and forced you to do magic,” Kara quickly said. “By our laws, he's a criminal. I don't know how things work in the Fifth Dimension and I'm not asking for any favours, or wishes, but he's dangerous, and has repeatedly squandered all chances given to him and is taking up space in the universe that could be filled by someone deserving of a chance at a good life.”

Mxy smiled and Kara fell back in relief, eyes falling shut when there was snap of his fingers and the fighting finally stopped.

***

Lena was surprisingly okay with what Kara had done, though she seemed distracted and lost in her own head. After what happened with Lillian and then Lex, Kara didn’t blame her. No matter what Lena said, and what a bastard he was, killing Lex would never be something that would come easily to her, nor would the consequences of that have been easy for her to live with. Technically, _Kara_ killed him and they would talk about that, but in that moment, all they had the energy for was to go tell Lu the good news.

Lena was wise enough to knock on the apartment door and Sam opened up, dressed in shorts and a Venture Tech T-Shirt, basically the green and black uniform the company’s softball team wore during practice. She looked sleepy, her hair tousled, but not nearly as much as Lu, who ducked beneath her arm, dressed similarly as she grumpily huffed at them.

Sam blinked and seemed to finally recall where she was.

“It’s not what it looks like,” she told Kara. “We were just—”

“It’s fine, really,” Kara rasped. “Please don’t feel the need to explain.”

“I passed out cuddling her, because I’m a sappy drunk,” Lu said, walking back inside, making everyone follow her into the apartment. “Is it time to go?”

“Well,” Kara looked to Lena who nodded at her to share the news as Kara was practically bouncing on her toes, despite Lena’s apparent reticence. “It looks like you can stay!”

Lu only stared at the floor and Sam tilted her head. “How?”

“To put things simply, we exchanged Lu for Lex,” Kara said and beamed at Lena who was frowning at Lu.

“So Lex is gone and we get to keep Lu?” Sam asked. “I mean Lu gets to stay?” she corrected and flushed.

“Yes!”

“No…” Lu said and everyone stiffened. “I never asked for this. I never said I wanted to stay here!”

Kara turned to Lena who bit her lip, but didn’t seem that surprised at the reaction, and then Sam stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who's been following this fic. I know some of you hate me and it hurts, but it's okay. *sniffs*  
> I will survive. For as long as I know how to love, I know I'm still alive.
> 
> Please enjoy the final chapter <3
> 
> I will reply to comments this upcoming week.

Kara adjusted her glasses and looked to Lena for some guidance, who subtly shook her head while Lu paced the apartment. Right. Lu was Lena and sometimes Lena needed a little time.

Placing her hands in the pockets of her slacks, she settled in to wait, but realised how strange it was to stand there staring.

“Should I go?” she whispered and before Lena could answer, Lu stopped pacing and glared at them.

“I don't deserve for her to look at me like that!” she shouted at Lena while pointing an accusing finger at Kara.

“Like what?” Kara wondered.

“Like you love me!” Lu spat and Kara cringe.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered and Lu cackled manically.

“It’s not you, darling,” Lena whispered, looking at Lu with a pained understanding.

“I don't deserve this,” Lu rasped. “Not her looking at me like I'm some hero. Not Sam, alive and starting to see me as someone she could be with after I failed to save her...Not Alex trusting me despite what I did to her and her wife…I can't get this chance—” Her breath hitched. “Not after everything I’ve done.”

And finally Kara got it and marched across the room, drawing Lu into her arms who immediately clung to her and sobbed into her neck. Kara rubbed her back and pressed her face into Lu’s hair blinking away her own tears.

“I don't believe that I would ever not have listened if you told me there was a cure for Reign,” Kara softly said. “And I don't believe that you would ever have taken your vengeance like that. You’re good. I’ve seen it time and again, under numerous circumstances.”

“But it happened,” Lu said, having gone still, but was tightly holding her back.

“Lex wished it,” Kara rasped. “He wanted you alone and angry. Specifically, angry at me. He made us the worst versions of ourselves so we could be weapons against each other when he brought you here. The fact that his plan instantly failed, just shows how inconceivable that world you remember was.”

“I felt them dying…I saw them…their faces…There was so much blood…”

“Mxy can take it away, you don’t need—”

Lu frantically shook her head. “Then who am I? Would I even still be me if he takes away my experiences? Will he give me Lena’s? Then wouldn’t I just be her? Will I start over like a child with a blank state? What would be the point of me staying if I cease to exist anyway?”

Lena cleared her throat and Kara helplessly looked to her.

“You have a chance to build a life surrounded by people who love you,” Lena rasped, carefully walking closer. “Look at me, look at how happy I am. Because Kara loves me.”

Kara shook her head. “It was because you took your life back.”

Lena had done all the hard work on her own. It was why she had no doubt that Lu would be able to do the same.

Lena sent her a beatific smile, before she looked at Lu peeking at her from Kara’s arms. “I won't force you to stay, but if you’re stuck on what you deserve or not, I personally think you deserve a chance at a life your world never granted you. One not based on stipulations and manipulations. One in which you actually have control over your destiny.”

Kara kissed Lu on the head, slowly releasing her, then kissed Lena on the lips. “I'm gonna give you two some time to talk,” she said and with a squeeze to Lena’s hand, left Lu to decide her own fate.

***

Closing the door behind her, Kara looked at Sam who had turned with her hands in her hair, body coiled tight with frustration.

“Why is she like this?!” Sam all but growled and Kara smiled because that was something she asked a lot when it came to Lena, even when she already knew the answer.

“Do you have clothes somewhere close, so we can go get some breakfast? Or I could make you something at our apartment?”

“Uhm,” Sam seemed hesitant, whether it was to be alone with Kara or to leave Lu alone, Kara didn’t know.

“They won’t assimilate anymore and will need Mxy if she still wants to go back after talking to Lena. She won’t and can’t just leave.”

Sam nodded. “Okay, I have an extra set of clothes in my office.”

***

“Kelly thinks the blood of alt-Lex disappeared because he didn’t technically exist,” Sam informed Kara on what had happened after they’d gone on their mission and Kelly had a chance to speak to Mxy.

Alex was at the warehouse with Brainy, Nia and the military task force, and she wasn’t sure what the conclusion would be of this entire situation. It was up to the government to decide whether the truth about Lex would be made public. With him gone, the only repercussions there would be, would fall on Lena for sharing his surname. And Kara trusted that Alex would try her utmost to prevent that, even if it meant Lex would be remembered in the annals of history as someone who was good.

“I figured that much when Mxy told me he would freeze Lex’s body here, but he’ll no doubt dissipate in a couple of weeks and out of existence once investigations have hopefully been completed.”

“I hate him so much,” Sam quietly fumed, not having touched her plate of food at Noonan’s. Instead, they both sat staring through the windows, mostly lost in thought with intermittent conversation. Or angry bursts of frustration from Sam.

“I’m just happy he’s gone. I hope Lillian stays away too. She blows hot and cold so often I can’t imagine what it does to Lena.”

“Did she really do that to Lu?”

“You saw Lu’s body?”

Sam sighed and shook her head. “She was wearing shorts and a T-Shirt. I saw her legs and arms, Kara, and she told me herself. We haven’t done anything aside from that kiss you walked in on. I think she knew she was going to leave so she kept it superficial. If she does stay, I don’t know what will happen between us, but I will always be Lena’s friend, no matter what version of her shows up.”

Kara nodded. “I’m sorry.”

“I get it.”

Silence fell.

“Lena loves people in a way that scares me sometimes,” Kara softly said. “Despite growing up in that awful home with those selfish people, she never became like them. They had so much power over her, for so long, because she loved them…”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Lena will convince Lu to stay. Lu will have stipulations that you may not like. I’m going to need you to accept all of them.”

“Of course I will. Look, I’m not gonna play the who knows Lena better game with her literal girlfriend who’s also her best friend, but I do know a lot about her.”

Kara thought of the kryptonite in Lu’s chest, of cancer, and of how stubborn Lu was and knew Sam was going to be pushed away roughly and repeatedly.

“You’ve always been a great friend, Sam,” she murmured, thinking of Sam being there the times Kara had gloriously failed.

“It’s easy with her.”

Kara bit her lip and nodded. “We should go check on them.”

“No, you go ahead. I need to get some work done and call Ruby. I don’t want to put more pressure on Lu by hovering. She can let me know when she’s ready to talk.”

***

Lena opened the door and Kara followed her inside where Lu stood brooding in the centre of the room. Kara busied herself getting a glass of water and slowly sipped on it while she leaned against the counter and pretended not to notice the intense eye contact and eyebrow lift communication going on between the Lenas.

Lu nodded and Lena turned to Kara.

“She wants punishment for her crimes.”

_Of course she did._

Kara nodded. “We could use your help protecting National City.”

Lu frowned. “Just like that? All my sins forgiven?”

“I told you. Lex wished for those actions,” Kara said. “If I believed you would agree to it, I would suggest you don’t need to do anything to make up for something that happened in a world that doesn’t exist.”

“You’re ridiculous,” Lu huffed.

“I’m smart,” Kara said. “It makes Lena very hot for me.”

Lena chuckled and Lu scoffed.

“Fine.”

“Great!” Kara grinned but it fell away when she noticed Lena’s expression. “What else?”

“She has requested that you not ask Mxy to take away the cancer.”

Kara was grateful for the red lights, or she would’ve shattered the glass in her hand, and carefully placed it on the counter beside her. Even when she’d anticipated the resistance, she’d still hoped, and stared at the floor rubbing the back of her neck. Her immediate reaction was to shout at Lu that she was being selfish to agree to stay only for them to watch her die, but after taking a few calming breaths, she realised that it was Lu’s life to live as she pleased. They’d promised her that she finally could.

“That cancer was given to you because of the alterations that were made to your world…” Kara still tried.

“People get cancer for reasons that are most likely never because they wanted it.”

Kara sighed. Lu was letting the cancer be her punishment. And maybe, mentally, it was what she needed to do to live with herself right now until she made peace with how beyond her control everything had been in that world.

“Okay,” Kara conceded for the time being. “If that’s what you need to happen.”

“It seems unfair to everyone suffering from this disease and all the survivors who fought to overcome it, to just have it be snapped away,” Lu softly said and Kara nodded jerkily.

Lena took Lu’s hand, distracting her from her thoughts.

“She’ll join the cancer trials though,” she said and Kara released a breath. “We’ll start with getting that poison out of her chest and building her a new heart.”

Kara grinned back at Lena’s smile. “I’m sure that she can help around the lab as part of her punishment.”

“Hardly punishment when it’s all I’ve ever wanted to do with my life,” Lu muttered.

“You can babysit for Alex and Kelly whenever they ask you to.”

Lu rolled her eyes, but she grinned and then her gaze grew soft. “Thank you, Kara,” she quietly said, with such meaning Kara’s chest nearly tore apart, her heart grew so big.

“Thanks, Lena,” she continued. Lena smiled and hugged her. And it wasn’t anything much, but then Lena pulled away and cupped Lu’s cheek and still it was a simple affection but Kara’s stomach tightened and a soft, breathy, noise escaped her. The Lenas turned, eyebrows raised, green eyes searching her face and their smirks grew as one.

“Well, then…” Lu practically purred, sending a shiver up Kara’s spine that made her wince.

“I’m sorry,” she immediately confessed. “I don’t know why that—”

"Look at her, Lena," Lu rasped and Kara bit her lip when she stepped closer to Lena whose heated gaze remained firmly on Kara. "She's been so good to us, hasn't she?" she said and placed a soft kiss against Lena's jaw.

“This is not happening…” Kara mumbled as Lena tilted her head to allow Lu access to her long elegant neck, dark eyes burning into Kara whose heart frantically hammered in her chest.

“Let's give her something to remember on those nights she's far away; off saving the world," Lu murmured and Lena's lips curled in to another sexy smirk, then slowly parted to accept the kiss from Lu.

Kara let out a soft whine, watching Lu's fingers gently trace Lena's jawline, their lips moving against each other, the tips of their tongues lightly touching… Kara throbbed when she caught Lena’s hooded and heated stare still on her, tracing over her body and trapping her against the kitchen counter. She barely breathed. Afraid the slightest movement from her would shatter the moment.

It was Lu who moved away though and Lena sucked her bottom lip into her mouth.

Kara couldn’t stop staring at her, feeling dizzy, her knees weak and blindly handed over her phone when Lu asked if she could use it to call Sam. “I’ll make sure no one disturbs you.” She smirked and swaggered out the door.

“Lena, I’m so sorry, I don’t why my body—”

She paused when Lena stalked toward her.

“It’s two of you, you know?” Kara tried to continue her explanation. “Two of your face and your mouth and it’s just too much pretty—”

She felt fingers unbuttoning her pants, her stomach clenching when her zipper was slowly pulled down and Lena’s lips crashed onto her own.

Humming into the kiss, Kara grinned widely and Lena pulled back to lift a brow at her, fingers tracing patterns beneath Kara’s shirt.

“You cheated on me,” Kara whispered in awe and Lena shook her head.

“I can see how very distraught you are about that.”

Kara tried and failed to stop her face from smiling. “You’ll need to make it up to me, Lena.”

She got a slow spreading grin for the suggestion and Lena’s fingers slipped over the front of her underwear. Kara’s eyes fluttered and she bit her lip, lightly rocking her hips into the gently pressure.

“Yes?”

“ _Yes_ ,” she all but breathed and moaned when Lena’s fingers slid into her panties; vaguely embarrassed by how wet she was when Lena removed her fingers and examined them.

“Is this for her?” Lena asked, and brought her wet fingers into her mouth, slowly sucking and Kara’s brain short-circuited.

“Who?” she dumbly asked and Lena let out a filthy chuckle, unbuttoning Kara’s shirt and she was already tweaking Kara’s nipple, fingers back between her legs when Kara realised she meant Lu and then that kiss replayed in her mind, their tongues sliding together, and she moaned from deep in her throat, hips stuttering.

Lena smirked attractively, her stroking fingers making Kara’s head swim, and pulled her into another deep kiss.

“Rripiv sem khuhtiv beht?” Lena rasped and Kara let out a shuddering cry.

_Do you want my mouth?_

***

It didn’t take long for Lena to make her come on the counter. Honestly, it was the least she could do since she and Lu had started it all. Kara was desperate to get her home where they hopefully wouldn’t be bothered and paused in the doorway to find Lu and Sam sitting side-by-side on the bed in the containment unit, softly talking with their backs to them. Maybe it was the orgasm brain, but for once, their closeness didn’t make Kara’s stomach knot.

Lena’s expression surprised her though. It shouldn’t have, but it did. It was the first time Kara noticed how Lena had never been jealous of Sam’s attention on Lu. In fact, she seemed almost relieved and definitely happy at the prospect. That said so much in how stupid Kara had been to ever think Lena held secret feelings for Sam.

“Look at them,” she said, face pulled in faux disgust. “All broody and sexy.”

Lena grinned.

“We’ve got issues too,” Kara told her. “I have nightmares at least once a week.”

Lena’s smile dropped. “I know.”

“I can be dark and intense if I wanted to be.”

Lena’s lips quivered until another smile bloomed on her face.

“No, don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like I’m _cute_ ,” she spat out the word and Lena only grinned wider.

“No, you’re very dark and broody,” Lena said, poorly fighting down her smile. “In fact, I’m finding you very menacing right now.”

“ _Lena_ ,” Kara whined, unable to stop her bottom lip from poking out.

“Aw, that pout is simply sinister. Lu is stupid for not fighting me for you.”

Kara grinned. “She knows you’ll kick her butt.”

“Damn straight. Would punch her in the face.”

Chuckling softly, she pulled Lena into a hug. “Let’s go home and play with Kenneth. We’ve been neglecting her lately.”

Lena groaned. “We need to talk to Alex first, who needs to actually help us keep Lu here legally. And she’s going to need to stay down here for a while, so we should get her some clothes and things of her own while we sort out her documentation. Maybe get her a disguise too…She’s been getting migraines and ironically the kryptonite helps alleviate the pain when she’s under the sun so it would be nice if she could go outside sometimes and get some fresh air.”

Kara slumped guiltily, but then perked up at an idea.

“It’s been a long night, why don’t you go home and rest and I’ll go take care of as much of those tasks as I can today.”

“You’ve had a long night too.”

“I can recharge in the sun, and then come home and tongue you at super-speed until you pass out on my face.”

And Kara knew it was mean, considering how horny Lena probably already was, but still she felt insanely proud of herself for the soft moan and the full body tremble she could feel surging through Lena at the suggestion.

“I want to marry you,” Lena mumbled into her neck.

Kara grinned. She wasn’t very natural at dirty talk, but tried because of how well it always worked on Lena. “I’d like to marry you, too.”

“No, Kara. I want to marry you and officially call you my wife.”

Kara froze and her heart gave an excited thud. “Oh…”

Lena took a step back and stared at the floor. “For the last few months, I’ve been seeking out jewellers around the world—”

“ _That_ _’s_ the reason behind the mysterious trips you’ve been taking?” she incredulously asked. She’d known Lena was hiding something, but she figured she was building like a massive portal for intergalactic space-travel, or something.

“I’ve designed rings and Kryptonian wedding bracelets…” Lena continued as though Kara hadn’t interrupted. “Made a few here in the lab to be nearly as indestructible as you are. I looked at gemstones to match the colour of your eyes, ones that matched my own so you would be reminded of me…And you know what I realised?”

Lips parted, heart hammering against her ribs, Kara dumbly shook her head.

“I realised that Supergirl can’t wear a wedding ring, or any jewellery that you’re also wearing.”

“But my watch…”

“The watch has a function, but a ring or a bracelet with no purpose will come under a lot scrutiny.”

“I can take it off when I put on the suit.”

“I thought that too, but then I remembered that you’re you and you will likely lose it, possibly somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, which I would understand, but would make you really sad.”

Kara nodded, sad already at just the thought of it.

“Remember when we were flying over Blueriver County and you said how much you loved how clear the sky was and that it’s so much quieter there?”

Kara frowned at the abrupt change in topic. Was she not being proposed to anymore? Or were they discussing the possibility of a proposal? “It sounds like something I would say, but I don’t remember the particular moment I said it to you…”

“We had sex on that hilltop and a bee stung me on the ass.”

Kara snorted out a laugh. “Well, obviously I forgot what I said, since more eventful things had been happening.”

“Mhm, so instead of a ring that would never be able to live up to you, I bought you the house we saw nestled down in the valley.”

“You what? Lena, that was a vineyard…”

“You laid with your head in my lap and spoke about the life you imagined for yourself when you were younger. A normal life. In a big house like that one.”

Kara bit her lip, tears stinging in her eyes.

“It’s only a forty-minute drive from the city and has space to avoid nosy neighbours seeing you coming and going…”

“Yeah...”

“I’ve converted the basement into a private lab so I can be home more often and look after that puppy you’ve always wanted when you can’t be home yourself.”

“Lena…”

“It also has a lot of rooms, for your friends and family to come visit and stay awhile.”

“Our.”

“For our friends and family,” Lena conceded with a soft smile. “There’s this space up in the attic…I know it sounds creepy, like I intend to lock you away, but, I just finished renovating it, installing this massive skylight I just know you’re going to love…and it could be a private space for you to paint and write in...”

“Oh, wow…”

“I’ve set up some security around the house, electric fencing around the boundary lines of the property, and had my lab, your studio and the master bedroom soundproofed and fitted with Red Sun lights. The house remains unfurnished though. I hope you might like to decorate it with me to make it our own?”

Kara nodded mutely.

“And maybe, someday, we can convert one or two of those guest rooms into nurseries…”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry I don’t have anything to give you right now. The keys to the house are in my safe…I didn’t plan—I wanted to take you on a picnic on that hilltop and ask—I could go down on one knee but it’s hardly your custom—”

She paused when Kara stepped forward and took Lena’s shaking hands in her own, who drew in a shuddering breath that rattled in Kara’s chest when Lena hesitantly met her eyes. She dipped down and pressed their foreheads together.

“Lena, you could propose to me with a rock tied in a ribbon and I would say yes to marrying you.”

“Yeah?” she asked, relaxing slightly.

“I would marry you if you gave me a plastic ring, and told me we would need to live in a tiny apartment on the noisiest street in National City for the rest of our lives.”

Lena smiled, finally seeming to breathe easier.

“I would marry you if you gave me a penny to stick to my palm with glue that I needed to keep there forever or die and leave you a young and beautiful widow.”

Lena laughed. “You’re ridiculous and don’t joke about that.” She wrapped her arms around Kara’s neck and stared up at her, eyes glittering and Kara thought of the ring she had stashed at the back of her sock drawer and grinned brightly.

“I would marry you if you wrote me a note and asked me to meet you at City Hall in the morning.”

“Eliza would kill me.”

Kara breathed in when Lena hugged her close, her eyes fluttering closed when Lena pressed her face into her neck, holding her tightly.

“I would marry you if you simply asked me to, and would spend the rest of my life making sure you never doubted how much I loved you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #BlackLivesMatter  
> Support the movement by spreading truth and/or donating to reputable causes/foundations. Signing petitions are 100% free.
> 
> @NotSoEvilPanda  
> <3


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